Why are these Hispanic voters trending Left?

In response to Ted Cruz-Hispanic Vote Up for Grabs:

I would love to hear your thoughts about why the Hispanic vote is generally trending Left, Javier.  The old conventional wisdom held that their religious values would make then natural conservative voters, but I think we’ve pretty much left that conventional wisdom for dead after 2012.  

Another idea we often hear kicked around is that Hispanic voters don’t actually care about the immigration issue per se – in fact, a sizable cohort of legal immigrants who worked hard to earn that distinction resent the people who are trying to barge in and seize it – but it’s a “gateway issue” for them.  They hear Republicans saying mean things about illegal immigrants (or, if you prefer, listen to media/Democrat caricatures of what those Republicans think about immigration, with the dark insinuation that it’s not just the illegal kind they oppose) and it makes them tune out everything else the GOP is saying.

Is that a valid explanation in your view, are Hispanic voters responding to pop-culture influence and strong targeted Democrat campaigns… or is this more a question of Hispanic voters positively identifying with Democrat Big Government policies?  If so, why?  And what can the likes of Ted Cruz do to persuade them otherwise?