Poll: Obama leading among Latino voters optimistic about future

President Obama is still leading among Latino voters, but Mitt Romney has made some recent gains, according to a new poll released this week.

The poll by Fox News Latino (FNL) found that Obama leads with 60 to Romney’s 30 percent among likely Latino voters.

Obama still has a comfortable lead in recent polls, although Romney has made gradual gains from the low 20s in recent months. In a July poll from Latino Decisions, Obama had 70 percent to Romney’s 22.  That same poll now shows Obama leading Romney at 68 to 26 percent, although the gap is even wider in Obama’s favor among Hispanic women.

This week, Romney unrolled an aggressive pitch to Latino voters, speaking to the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce participating in a "Meet the Candidate" segment on Spanish-language "Univision News,” and celebrating Hispanic Heritage Month with a new Web video.

In June, Obama announced that his administration would stop deporting illegal immigrants who come to the country at a young age and meet certain requirements, a popular move among a majority of Hispanics expected to help further bolster his support in the key voting bloc.

Recent polls have indicated less enthusiasm among Latinos for Obama than in 2008, when Obama won the Hispanic vote 67 to 31 over Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.). But in what could be difficult obstacle to Romney’s argument that voters are not “better off” than they were four years ago, according to the FNL survey, 74 percent of likely Latino voters said they feel “better off” than the last generation.

Latino voters are also extremely interested in the presidential election overall, according to the poll, with 80 percent “extremely” to “very” interested.

The national poll questioned 887 likely Latino voters over three days and has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.

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