Thread: Rubio: Obama 'poisoned the well' for reform on 'humanitarian' immigration crisis

By MAGGIE HABERMAN |
10/16/12 12:18 PM EDT
POLITICO
11 comments

Sen. Marco Rubio told reporters at a Bloomberg View breakfast that the crisis of immigration is a "humanitarian" one, but that the way President Barack Obama had gone about temporarily halting deportations of some illegal immigrants had "poisoned the well" for immigration.

The situation with children of illegal immigrants who were brought here "Is really akin more to refugees than it is to an immigration violator because it’s not their fault that they’re here," he said.

The criticism of Obama was "the process by which he did it," he said.

"There's going to be problems in implementing it," he added, faulting the "temporary" move because it has set the clock in motion. "There will be bad stories that emerge from it."

He added that he isn't interested in promoting a version of the DREAM Act "as an election-year project. ... These are real people. I’ve met these people; I live near them. … I’ve seen their tears. I’m not in this for some political maneuver," he said, adding he had done this long enough that "if I wanted a talking point" or to outmaneuver someone, he could have.

Asked if he was comfortable with Mitt Romney saying he would honor those halted deportations, he said, "What I’m really comfortable with is he’s said he wants to find a permanent solution" to the problem.

At another point, he argued that he doesn't think the Medicare issue that has come up extensively about Romney and Paul Ryan will hurt the ticket, including in senior-heavy Florida, and said he expects Romney to win his state.

Rubio: Obama 'poisoned the well' for reform on 'humanitarian' immigration crisis - POLITICO.com

Javier Ortiz: 'Obama Has Not Made Meaningful Attempts to Reform Immigration'

By Javier Ortiz
Published October 01, 2012

Much has been written over the years about President Obama’s lofty rhetoric, particularly when he was a candidate on the campaign trail in 2008.
His sweeping speeches were filled with huge promises.

Recently, the media was amazed when Univision’s Jorge Ramos and Maria Elena Salinas delivered what is widely considered the toughest interview of President Obama in this election cycle.

But why should they be surprised?

President Obama has not made any meaningful attempts to reform immigration policy, even though doing so would have a profound effect on short- and long-term economic growth.

“A promise is a promise,” Ramos said to the President. “And with all due respect, you didn’t keep that promise.”

Should we be surprised? Let’s examine the facts.

In 2007, when Congress was so close to finally achieving comprehensive immigration reform, then-Sen. Barack Obama voted for a so-called poison pill amendment that every senator knew would effectively kill the legislation.

Don’t believe me, just look at his "Yes" vote on the deal-breaking Dorgan Amendment and see for yourself. Perhaps he was against immigration reform before he was for it.

Three and half years later, many of those promises are left unfulfilled. This is evidenced by his pledge to tackle immigration reform, which has been all but forgotten. For the President, it’s not on the back burner. In fact, it’s not even on the stove.

The Hispanic community should not let him off the hook on immigration.

As is all-too common for this President, instead of taking the blame for the lack of progress on immigration, he found excuses and engaged in finger pointing against Republicans in Congress.
According to ABC News, “the President said he was also taken aback by the resistance he said he received from Republican lawmakers when he reached out to them about an immigration bill.”

When Latinos go to the polls on Nov. 6th, they should remember one critical fact about President Obama’s approach to immigration reform: he never really intended to lead on the issue. If it is true that Democrats are indeed the so-called champions of immigrants and reform legislation, then all we can do is wonder what happened.
In his first two years in office, the President enjoyed massive Democratic majorities, yet he never made any meaningful attempts to change our nation’s immigration laws. Obama has had three and half years to rectify that mistake; and instead of attempting to do so, he has punted the immigration issue at every opportunity.

What’s even more frustrating than the President’s stunning lack of leadership on this front is the fact that a formidable majority of Hispanics are expected to vote for him. Unlike the President, Gov. Mitt Romney is making an earnest and serious attempt to reform our broken immigration system and get Americans back to work. He outlined his intentions during a recent speech at the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

In that speech, Governor Romney said, “Americans may disagree about how to fix our immigration system, but I think we can all agree that is broken,” Romney said. “For years, Republicans and Democrats seem to have been more interested in playing politics with immigration than with actually fixing it … I will work with Republicans and Democrats to permanently fix our immigration system.”

In his speech, the Governor also laid out his economic vision and clearly articulated why fundamental conservative philosophies of individual freedom and free enterprise appeal to Latinos.

I firmly believe that –if elected– Mitt Romney will lead on reducing the debt, creating jobs and immigration reform –not just because he made the promise– but because he keenly understands how important it will be to turning around America’s economy and creating jobs.

This election is just too important for Hispanic voters to give President Obama another free pass.

Read more: Javier Ortiz: 'Obama Has Not Made Meaningful Attempts to Reform Immigration' | Fox News Latino


Taking care of the Unions

Who Killed the 2007 Immigration Reform Bill? Senator Barack Obama

Despite being the President who has deported the most illegal aliens in history–a policy hugely unpopular with Hispanics–Barack Obama is the strong preference among Hispanics in the 2012 election. They may not be overly enthusiastic about Obama but they aren’t running to Mitt Romney yet either. however, despite Barack Obama’s statements to the contrary, he has not always supported comprehensive immigration reform. In fact, he worked vigorously to kill it in 2007. Bill McGurn in the Wall Street Journal recounts how Obama injected himself into the 2007 legislative sausage making and jumped on a “poison pill” amendment that killed immigration reform:

The short story is that the immigration bill was the work of a small, bipartisan group of senators. Late in the game, Mr. Obama joined the process, where he asked for (and received) changes in the bill. Yet when the legislation moved forward, Mr. Obama backed a series of poison-pill amendments. One was pushed by Sen. Byron Dorgan (D., N.D.) to weaken the guest-worker program. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D., Mass.) was outraged because he knew this amendment was really organized labor’s effort to kill the immigration bill, not to help workers. “Who is the senator from North Dakota trying to fool?” Mr. Kennedy snapped from the Senate floor.

Mr. Obama voted “yea” on the Dorgan amendment. We know he knew it was a deal-killer because several senators had said so (Sen. Jim DeMint, who had voted “nay” on an earlier version, switched his vote for precisely that reason). Thus Mr. Obama pulled off a trifecta: appeasing Big Labor while telling Latinos he supported the bill and blaming Republicans for its failure…What makes Mr. Obama’s 2007 Senate vote so galling—and different from that of others who voted the same way—was that his support for the poison pills betrayed the bipartisan group of senators who had let him in on the writing of the bill.

By no means was the death of immigration reform done at the hands of only the then-Senator from Illinois. But he was a principal in the unraveling of the most successful effort to that point. Having not lifted a finger on behalf of Hispanics since entering the White House while achieving record-breaking deportations, Hispanics have a lot to think about in November before backing theimmigration reform killer again.
Who Killed the 2007 Immigration Reform Bill? Senator Barack Obama « Battleground Watch

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