Blame immigration, a prominent Republican strategist tells the BBC.

Changing US demographics - particularly a growing Hispanic voting bloc that traditionally trended Democrat - have forced the conservative party to step back from immigration and what was once an easy political target.

Party leaders have recently put on hold talks of immigration reform until after November's mid-term elections, citing distrust of US President Barack Obama.

But many have called it a maneuver to, if not appeal to Hispanic voters, not ostracise them as Republicans eye the 2016 presidential election.

In Arizona, Republican lawmakers are facing a population that is currently 30% Hispanic, well above the 16.9% US average.

In 2012, the party lost ground in both chambers, shedding seats in the Senate and the House of Representatives.

Given the growing Hispanic birth rate, Republicans are seen as in real danger of losing control in the state.

"If they don't find a way over the next several years to bring the Hispanics into the fold, the Republicans are going to become the minority party," Republican strategist Ford O'Connell says.

Losing a majority at the state level may not seem like the worst thing in the world.

But only the political party in control of the state legislature decennially, next in 2020, gets the ultimate prize: redistricting rights.

Redistricting can reshape the state and national landscape for a political party - and perhaps more importantly, the opposing party - for years to follow.

And right now, Republicans are losing ground, forcing them to throw political "red meat" to invigorate their conservative base, O'Connell says.

So, if immigration is shelved and anti-gay legislation is proving to be a live grenade, what issues are left for the conservative party to campaign on?

"Jobs, college affordability, tax reform, energy and transportation," O'Connell says.

The drawback: None of those are considered "sexy" hot-button topics that will energise supporters and bring new members into the fold.

"What it means at the end of the day is Republicans are going to have to reassess over time exactly how they expand the tent and what are the best policies overall to make sure they win [key] states" like Arizona, O'Connell says.

Read more from Deborah Siegelbaum at BBC News 

If Republicans think President Obama is going to railroad them on the "fiscal cliff," just wait - because he plans to push immigration reform early in 2013. My advice to Republicans is don't want for Obama's to make the first move on this issue, but take control of immigration reform and make it a GOP issue. The Los Angeles Times' Brian Bennett has more:

As soon as the confrontation over fiscal policy winds down, the Obama administration will begin an all-out drive for comprehensive immigration reform, including seeking a path to citizenship for 11 million illegal immigrants, according to officials briefed on the plans.

While key tactical decisions are still being made, President Obama wants a catch-all bill that would also bolster border security measures, ratchet up penalties for employers who hire illegal immigrants, and make it easier to bring in foreign workers under special visas, among other elements.

Senior White House advisors plan to launch a social media blitz in January, and expect to tap the same organizations and unions that helped get a record number of Latino voters to reelect the president.

With a rainbow coalition of voters propelling President Obama to a decisive Electoral College victory in which all but one battleground state turned blue, election night 2012 was a wake-up call for many Republicans. Now, the GOP is beginning to delve into a long and likely divisive period of self-examination over what it can do to right itself with a rapidly changing America.

The consensus among many top Republican strategists and politicos, from Karl Rove to formerArkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee to Sen. Marco Rubio is this: If the GOP can't rebuild a foundation more welcoming to key subsets of the electorate, it runs the risk of being shut out of the White House for good.

But grapple it must, warns Republican strategist Ford O'Connell, "or else [it will be] wiped off the electoral map."

That means immigration reform.

"It's very simple," says Mr. O'Connell, chairman of the Civic Forum PAC in Washington. "We've got to take control of immigration reform."

Republicans can look to rising stars like Gov. Susana Martinez of New Mexico and Senator Rubio of Florida for leadership on reform, including a better system to admit temporary workers and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants – an ongoing point of contention in the party. Amnesty should be an option "if we can come up with a plan to secure the border," O'Connell adds.

Read more from Husna Haq at The Christian Science Monitor

I do see the merit in what former Rep. Tom Davis (R-VA) and retiring Rep. Steve LaTourette are advocating. That said, establishment Republicans need to shoulder a significant portion of the blame for the ballot box failures in 2012. From Breanna Edwards at Politico:

“Some of the groups that would have agreed with us on a lot of issues, they don’t even look at us. We scare them,” said former Rep. Tom Davis (R-Va.).

Davis appeared with retiring Rep. Steve LaTourette at the Capitol Hill Club Friday to discuss poll findings of Main Street Advocacy, a nonprofit managed by Davis. Their main message: partisans on both sides need to stop bickering so much and start compromising on issues like the fiscal cliff.

But both men said the GOP’s problem go beyond partisanship. Republicans, they argued, need to stop looking at voters as members of groups — whether it's women, African-Americans, Latinos or Asian-Americans — and just look at them as Americans.

Mitt Romney is ramping up his outreach to Hispanic voters, softening his rhetoric on undocumented immigrants and making a major investment in Spanish-language media.

The renewed push — focused on the key swing states of Colorado, Nevada and Florida — comes as polls show President Obama increasing his already-large nationwide lead over Romney with Hispanic voters, although swing-state polls of Latinos offer a more inconclusive picture.

Republicans with an eye on the fast-growing Hispanic population commended Romney’s comments and his campaign’s renewed focus, though some worry they’re coming too late.

“It’s the right move; they’re doing the right things. I just wish they had been doing them earlier,” said GOP strategist Ford O’Connell.

Read more from Cameron Joseph at The Hill

If Romney takes this further, he could have a real ballot box winning issue in November, particularly in the southwestern part of the country. From Allison Sherry at DenverPost.com:

Young illegal immigrants who receive temporary work permits to stay in the United States under an executive order issued by President Barack Obama would not be deported under a Mitt Romney administration, the GOP presidential hopeful told The Denver Post Monday.

"The people who have received the special visa that the president has put in place, which is a two-year visa, should expect that the visa would continue to be valid. I'm not going to take something that they've purchased," Romney said. "Before those visas have expired we will have the full immigration reform plan that I've proposed."

Romney said in a sit-down interview with The Post aboard his campaign bus ahead of a Denver rally that he would work with Congress in the first year to pass permanent immigration reform legislation.

He didn't furnish specifics on that plan, but has said in previous interviews that students who served in the military may get a path to citizenship.

Some Republican strategists are already preparing for the worst. The numbers, frankly, are dismal. Nearly 2 of every 3 Latinos favor President Obama to Mitt Romney. Voters in the gay and lesbian community favor Mr. Obama by the same margin. Women favor the president by 51 percent to 41 percent, according to an August NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. And African-Americans? One poll suggested that Mr. Romney is being skunked: 94 percent to 0 percent.

Clearly, the GOP has a minority problem. But Republican strategists aren't just worried about November – they're worried about the Novembers after that.

"The GOP cannot continue to be the party of old, white men and succeed on the electoral map, [and in] the White House, going forward," says Ford O'Connell, a Republican strategist and chairman of the political-action committee Civic Forum PAC in Washington.

"That's why Romney's hanging on," says O'Connell. "The white working-class, blue-collar voters. That is essentially his base."

What's more, minorities are less likely than whites to be eligible and registered to vote, and to turn out at the polls. But Romney is running on excessively thin margins.

The minority vote "is likely to push President Obama over the top," says O'Connell.

Even if Romney could pull it out, the win would not be a road map for the future.

Some Republicans, such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, and former President George W. Bush, have been warning the party for years that it needs to do more to reach out to minorities, especially Hispanics. "It's next to impossible to compete if the numbers are against you," says O'Connell. "If the rest of the GOP was singing this tune, they would be much better off."

Read more from Husna Haq at The Christian Science Monitor

With less than seven weeks to go until Election Day 2012, Ford O'Connell and Democratic operative Kristian Ramos join Fox News' Chris Stirewalt on Fox News Live's "Power Play w/Chris Stirewalt" to discuss the electoral significance of Florida, the role of Hispanic voters, and the current state of the battle for the White House between President Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney.

From Gerald Seib at The Wall Street Journal:

[T]he key to being elected is to win the groups that should be friendly to a candidate—and to pile up so large a margin among the friendliest of them that their votes can offset the inevitable losses among less-friendly groups.

All this is especially true in a close presidential race, as this year's figures to be. Thus, in the case of President Barack Obama, seeking re-election in a stormy economic environment, his campaign is relying on four cornerstones to hold the effort steady. To see how the president is doing, start by watching these groups:

Young voters. Mr. Obama simply has to win big here. And he will. In aggregated Wall Street Journal/NBC News polling through the first half of the year, the president was preferred over Republican Mitt Romney by almost 20 percentage points among voters 18 to 29 years old.

College-educated white women. Mr. Romney is almost certain to win among white voters overall, largely because he will win big among white men, who simply aren't a great audience for Mr. Obama.

Hispanics. If Mr. Obama can win more than 60% of Hispanic votes, he will have taken a big step toward victory. Conversely, if Mr. Romney can hold the president below 60%, the electoral math shifts significantly in his favor because of his advantages elsewhere.

African-Americans. This has been and will remain Mr. Obama's strongest single group. The president almost certainly will get something in the neighborhood of 90% of the vote. 

From Gallup:

A majority of U.S. Hispanics identify as political independents (51%) rather than as Democrats (32%) or Republicans (11%). However, once their partisan leanings are taken into account, most Hispanics affiliate with the Democratic Party (52%) rather than the Republican Party (23%). Both sets of numbers shift more decisively in the Democrats' favor among the roughly half of U.S. Hispanics who are registered to vote.