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Bush Says Marking Hispanic on Voter Application a Mistake

Likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said Monday that marking Hispanic on his 2009 voter register application was a simple mistake.
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, speaks at the South Carolina house republican caucus reception in Columbia, S.C., Tuesday, March 17, 2015. Bush said Tuesday that minimum wage increases should be left to businesses and state governments, opposing a hike in the federal pay floor as an impediment to individuals trying to escape from poverty. (AP Photo/The State, Tim Dominick) ALL LOCAL MEDIA OUT, (TV, ONLINE, PRINT)
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, speaks at the South Carolina house republican caucus reception in Columbia, S.C., Tuesday, March 17, 2015. Bush said Tuesday that minimum wage increases should be left to businesses and state governments, opposing a hike in the federal pay floor as an impediment to individuals trying to escape from poverty. (AP Photo/The State, Tim Dominick) ALL LOCAL MEDIA OUT, (TV, ONLINE, PRINT) Tim Dominick / AP
/ Source: NBC News

Likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush said Monday that marking his race as Hispanic on his 2009 voter registration application was a simple mistake.

The former Florida governor’s wife, Columba, is from Mexico and he spent time working in Venezuela for the Texas Commerce Bank in his 20s. Bush speaks fluent Spanish and has worked hard to court Hispanic voters by supporting a pathway for undocumented immigrants to obtain legal status.

But the New York Time’s notes that Bush may have gotten “carried away” when he checked Hispanic in the “race/ethnicity” field on his 2009 voter-registration application to the Miami-Dade County Elections Department. The son of former President George H.W. Bush and brother to former President George W. Bush was born in Texas.

His son Jeb Bush Jr., who is half Hispanic, joked on Twitter that his father is an #HonoraryLatino.

IN-DEPTH

-- Andrew Rafferty