In 2008, Maria says she cast her ballot for Obama because of Clinton's endorsement.

Now, she says family values are one of several factors pushing her away from the Democrats and making her consider voting Republican.

Obama has gone "way, way overboard" on issues such as same-sex marriage and abortion, she says.

"If a person wants to be gay, that's fine, that's their lifestyle," Maria says. "I don't want it being imposed on me, or my family, or children."

Marriage should be between a man and a woman, she says. The goal should be having a baby.

Abortion also riles her, especially because there are so many families who want to adopt.

Maria likes Romney's values -- particularly his stance against Roe v. Wade -- but she's not sure about his religion.

"You know, he believes in God, and he believes in Jesus. The rest of his religion, I'm not for," she says. "It's like a cult."

Her own family is fractured. She hasn't seen her 36-year-old daughter in five years.

Maria was a tough parent when her daughter was a teenager. She says their relationship never recovered.

"I'm hoping that eventually she'll see that I wasn't a bad person," Maria says.

She and David dreamt of adopting, but their plans fell through.

They kept the baby furniture, just in case.

For days, Maria and David have been wondering about a tiny roadside restaurant near their new neighborhood. The parking lot always seems packed. Inside, dozens of license plates hang above the counter, each emblazoned with the name of a different city in Puerto Rico and the phrase "Isla del Encanto." Island of Enchantment.

"I like that," Maria says as she walks in for the first time.

Maria was born on the island but moved to Miami with her mother when she was 3 weeks old. Her father had shelled out $8,000 to buy the family's first house.

Growing up as a Puerto Rican in the Miami suburb of Hialeah during the end of the Jim Crow era wasn't easy, Maria says. By the letter of a law passed in 1917, they were U.S. citizens. But it didn't always feel that way.

Her father had darker, caramel-colored skin. Her hazel-eyed mother's skin was light.

Drinking fountains were labeled black and white. Maria didn't know which one to use.

When the family went on road trips, her father filled the back seats with empty cans so they wouldn't have to make any pit stops. If they stayed in a hotel, they picked a room as far from the manager's office as possible. It's a painful memory that flashes through her mind whenever she hears about states such as Arizona and Alabama passing their own immigration laws.

"We tried to assimilate the American way," she says.

But others on their street noticed, even when they laid low.

"The neighbors looked at us as being black and white, when we weren't," Maria says.

One time, through the window, Maria watched flames shoot from a wooden cross ablaze on their front lawn.

She remembers seeing her father march angrily down the street. Later, she learned that when neighbors told him his family wasn't welcome, he stood his ground. "We're here," he said. "And we're here to stay."