GARLAND — Just in time for presidential elections in November, citizenship campaigns are rolling out for foreign-born residents who want to fully and finally bridge the distance between their birthplace and their adopted U.S.A.

Pablin Marin, a glass cutter by day, whips through the civics lesson in his citizenship class at a Garland church, leading his classmates on the mission of the U.S. Supreme Court.

“The Supreme Court makes sure that laws are consistent with the Constitution,” he says, reading from a prepared statement in his class. “If they are unconstitutional, they are not valid.”

Citizenship classes like this one are producing results. Naturalization applications are increasing. For the first two months of 2012, citizenship applications are up 21 percent over the same time last year, according to the federal immigration and citizenship agency.

The prospect pool is deep: About 8.1 million immigrants with legal status have been in the U.S. long enough to apply for naturalization. In Texas, almost 900,000 immigrants are eligible, according to federal immigration data.

Voting motivates Marin, a 32-year-old native of northern Mexico who wears a lime-green T-shirt over jeans. He takes careful notes in class and seems relieved to be away from the drug violence back in his home state of Durango.

“I want to be part of the United States,” he said. “I can choose my president.”

Four years ago, a record number of people — 1 million — naturalized in time for November elections, but beating a large fee increase partly swelled the surge. Like then, tough immigration proposals play a role.

Mas respeto, more respect, is even the motto for one coalition campaigning for those with legal permanent residency, or green cards, to become citizens.

Most important, U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services officials say a naturalization application can be processed in five months — a third of the time it took four years ago. In the Dallas region, processing can be as short as three months, said spokeswoman Maria Elena Garcia Upson, and community workers verified the claim.

Voter registration groups frequently greet newly minted citizens at the nearly daily naturalization ceremonies at the Irving headquarters of the U.S. citizenship agency. Anyone who is a citizen and meets Texas residency requirements has until Oct. 9 to register for the Nov. 6 election.

Connecting

“The connection between citizenship and immigration politics is really being made,” said Frances Valdez, an attorney promoting April citizenship events in Texas for the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Enthusiasm makes workshops “like rock concerts,” Valdez said. “People are waiting in line to get in and we only have a certain amount of capacity.”

A big bloc of potential new citizens are Hispanic, making them valuable to candidates and both political parties because they vote. In 2010, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, naturalized foreign-born Latinos were more likely to vote than native-born Latinos — about 37 percent to 29 percent.

“The recent converts in anything are the greatest zealots,” says state Rep. Rafael Anchía, a Democrat and the immediate past chair of the bipartisan National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials. “New citizens are most excited about exercising their new voting rights.”

Latinos vote Democratic by a 2-1 ratio. But in 2010, two states elected Hispanic Republicans as governors. The number of Latino Republicans in Congress increased from three to seven, including Texans Francisco “Quico” Canseco of San Antonio and Bill Flores of Bryan. Every year, 500,000 Latinos turn age 18 and are eligible to vote, says Bettina Inclán, the new director of Hispanic outreach for the Republican National Committee.

Registration drives outside naturalization ceremonies is one smart way to boost Latino voting strength, she said.

President Barack Obama is vulnerable for failing to provide a legalization program for illegal immigrants and the newly naturalized will remember, Inclán said. “They come to America because there’s accountability,” she said.

On the other side, Republicans haven’t offered much hope to immigrant families, who can come in combinations of U.S. citizens, legal permanent residents and those without legal status, said Ray de los Santos, who has run citizenship classes for the last year from a Dallas-based education project of the League of Latin American United Citizens.

“The whole atmosphere around the country is one where it is very difficult for immigrants,” de los Santos said. “You have candidates talking about making life so difficult for immigrants that they want to self-deport,” he said, referring to statements in January by presumed Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney.

Eager to help

Marin takes classes at a church hall in a program run by Catholic Charities of Dallas. The Dallas-based nonprofit won a $200,000 grant to provide such programs last year from the federal citizenship and immigration agency. The federal government began giving grants in 2009 — and Catholic Charities of Dallas was one of the initial winners.

Its program focuses on the mechanics of the naturalization tests so that students come out victors. Some guides come in English and Spanish, but prospective citizens are required to read, write and speak English. Waivers can be obtained for certain circumstances.

“The message we want to get across is to be prepared,” said Camila Francino, the lead citizenship instructor for the Refugee and Empowerment Project of Catholic Charities of Dallas.

DFW International Community Alliance launched classes last month with sponsorship from the local Telemundo Spanish-language station. With Telemundo publicity, the Dallas-based nonprofit quickly signed up more than 200 people.

“There is just a need in the community that isn’t filled,” said Hellen Fissihiae, a DFW International staffer. Fissihiae became naturalized at age 17 when her Eritrean-born father became a citizen.

Learning the ropes

The American Immigration Lawyers Association launched free training webinars as part of its annual April citizenship campaign and held a free Dallas workshop last Saturday. Two separate nonprofits — CitizenshipWorks.org and CitizenshipCounts.org — offer help online. Citizenship Counts hosted a naturalization event in Dallas last month with Dallas Mayor Mike Rawlings at an elementary school — one of the regular activities of the group.

The My Citizenship/My Vote campaign organizes around the “mas respeto” motto. Its organizers say citizenship is a good defense for legal immigrants worried about harsh proposals aimed at both legal and illegal immigrants or harsher policies that confuse legal immigrants with those here unlawfully.

Organizer Connie Choi, a staff attorney with the Asian Pacific American Legal Center, called the illegal-immigration proposals “the modern-day version of the Chinese Exclusion Act” of 1882.

The increase in naturalization applications, though, is nothing like in 2007 when fees for naturalization nearly doubled. The Ya Es Hora/Now Is the Time campaign, organized by the Latino officials association, accelerated the number of applications when it partnered with the Univision Spanish-language network.

In the classroom at Good Shepherd Catholic Church, Marin receives homework from instructor Alicia Paniagua. Check a search engine at www.house.gov to find your congresspersons, she advised students.

Marin doesn’t wait. With phone in hand, he goes to the website and types his zip code into a box. Then he whispers that it’s the White House that holds his focus. “Maybe I’ll stay with the same guy,” he said.

TOUGH QUESTIONS: Who is the speaker of the House? How many justices are there on the Supreme Court? What is the supreme law of the land? These questions stumped one of three native-born U.S. citizens who failed the civics portion of the naturalization test, according to a new national study released last week. That contrasts with the high pass rate of about 97 percent among immigrants applying for citizenship, according to Cincinnati-based Xavier University. The university’s Center for the Study of the American Dream conducted the survey earlier this year, polling about 1,000 people who were born in America. That resulted in a plus or minus margin of error of 3.1 percentage points.

NO TRICKS: “We are not trying to embarrass or humiliate,” said Michael Ford, the founding director of the center. “We have to engage to protect the things we hold dearly. If we are civically illiterate then that is a greater threat to our freedom than anything else because it makes you easier to manipulate and [susceptible to] abuses of power.”

SIX RIGHT: Passing the civics portion of the naturalization test requires answering six out of 10 questions correctly. If the pass rate were seven out of 10, half of native-born Americans would fail, the study found. The highest incorrect scores centered on the U.S. Constitution; the governmental, legal and political structure of the U.S. republic; and basic facts related to current political life including identification of key decision-makers, the researchers said.

THE ANSWERS: For the record, the answers to the frequently missed questions are: John Boehner is speaker of the House, there are nine justices on the Supreme Court, and the U.S. Constitution is the law of the land.

EASIER QUESTIONS: Survey responders consistently got these questions right: What is the name of the president of the United States? What is the capital of the United States? Where is the Statue of Liberty?