Barack Obama Still Hopeful on Immigration

Politico: President Barack Obama on Monday told an audience of predominantly Latinos that he’s hopeful an immigration overhaul bill will be able to pass Congress soon, even though he was unable to shepherd legislation for the DREAM Act to his desk before the first half of his first term, when Democrats controlled both houses. Obama made the remarks at Bell Multicultural High School in Washington as part of a forum on Latinos and education. At the town hall, a mother who identified herself as an activist for undocumented young people told the president about students who want to give up in school because they don’t think they’ll be able to stay in the United States. “I think that change in this country sometimes happens in fits and starts,” Obama replied. “It doesn’t happen overnight. If you think of the history of the civil rights struggle, though even after Brown v. Board of Education, there were still struggles to ensure that ultimately everybody was treated with dignity and respect.” Obama then noted that the DREAM Act, which would provide a means to citizenship for young people who stay in school or join the military, was “very close to passage” in Congress last time around. He added young people shouldn’t “be giving up, because if people in the past had given up, we probably wouldn’t have women’s rights; we wouldn’t have civil rights.”