Politico
By Katie Glueck
January 19, 2013
Some of the mayors closest to the debate surrounding illegal immigration say the time is now for a federal response, and they want Congress to act on reform before the moment slips away.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Saturday expressed optimism that Congress will pass comprehensive immigration reform, praising a number of Republicans for demonstrating openness to the issue.
“I’m very hopeful,” he told POLITICO. “I’m encouraged that Sen. McCain and Lindsey Graham and the eight senators who have worked in the past on this issue and see comprehensive immigration reform as vital to our economy and restoring our values.”
Villaraigosa spoke to POLITICO after addressing a meeting of the U.S. Conference of Mayors in Washington, where he called for a comprehensive approach to immigration reform. In an interview after his speech, Villaraigosa also praised Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who has outlined his own approach to the subject.
“I think the recent remarks by Sen. Rubio are encouraging, that he sees a pathway to citizenship as core to immigration reform and [is] willing to look at a comprehensive bill as a vehicle for that,” Villaraigosa said.
Villaraigosa, who according to a report in the Wall Street Journal hasn’t ruled out the possibility of a Cabinet post in the White House, outlined his vision for reform, which includes a path to citizenship for the millions of undocumented immigrants currently in the country. He stressed that while legalization must be “earned, it’s not automatic,” it “can’t be unattainable.”
“The time for half-measures and one-sided approaches is over,” he said. “The bottom line in this debate is full citizenship. There can be no second-class citizens in the United States of America. This doesn’t just make moral sense, it makes economic sense.”
A legalization process, he said, would include a criminal background check, proof of English language skills, American civic knowledge and payment of taxes.
To rousing applause, Villaraigosa also railed against deportation policies that split up families, saying that “family unification” should be a pillar of any immigration policy.
“I love when politicians on both sides of the aisle always talk about families,” he said during his speech. “They love to talk about families. And that’s a good thing. If we’re for families, we don’t divide them. We don’t send Mama and Daddy back, leave the kids here…family unification, protecting the sanctity of family, keeping families together, not only keeps capital in the United States, it also maximizes the potential that these immigrants start family-based small businesses and grow our economy.”
He also praised Mayor Raul Salinas, the Democratic mayor of Laredo, Texas, who chaired the conference’s task force on immigration reform.
“I think the time is now,” Salinas told POLITICO in an interview earlier this week. “The president has received an impressive mandate in critical states, and Latinos were very crucial…in November. It’s about doing the right thing. We have Latinos who served in the military, in Afghanistan, in Iraq, in Vietnam and other medals and gotten medals of honor, purple hearts. I think what we’re looking at is the proper path to citizenship. We’re not talking about amnesty.”
Salinas, who said that “hopefully the next Congress will pass immigration reform,” said some politicians might be reticent to tackle the issue because they are concerned about electoral ramifications of more Hispanic voters.
“I think one of the things that’s unfortunate is, some politicos are afraid of all of these Latinos becoming citizens,” Salinas said. “They are gonna be voting, how are they gonna vote?…I hope that’s not the case, but I think in states like Texas, states like California, Florida, you’re going to see emerging, stronger numbers of Latinos going out to vote if they become citizens. Then I think it might be scary to some political parties.”
But Salinas also said that at the Conference of Mayors, he had spoken with colleagues on both sides of the aisle who backed a comprehensive approach to reform.
“I just chaired a panel of mayors, Republicans and Democrats, who also agree it’s time to pave the way for immigration reform,” he said Thursday, reiterating again that “The time is now.”
Mayor Greg Stanton, the Democratic mayor of Phoenix, echoed his Los Angeles and Laredo counterparts in saying that “the time is now” to take on immigration reform.
“Like Mayor Villaraigosa, I am more confident now than I’ve been in a long time that the time is now,” he told POLITICO. “And this is actually going to occur in our Congress and the right, positive things are going to occur on this issue.”
He cited the “confluence of good policy and good politics” — including an increasing number, he said, of Republicans expressing interest in immigration reform.
“[We] are now at a moment in time when a confluence of good policy and good politics seems to be coming together, Stanton said. He added later, “The politics is coming together because I think, more in a bipartisan way, more and more Republicans are understanding not only the economic benefits of immigration reform but that they understand that demographics is destiny and if they don’t adopt smarter policies and smarter rhetoric, it will ultimately hurt their political opportunities over the long haul.”
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