New York Times (Editorial)
May 7, 2015
With
her speech on immigration in Las Vegas on Tuesday, Hillary Rodham
Clinton took a large step forward, up front and to the left of President
Obama. That is a good place
to be for a presidential candidate who proposes to get the stalled
debate moving again, and to bring hope to the millions living here
outside the law.
Mrs.
Clinton defended a path to citizenship for those 11 million, and
promised as president to take executive action — more broadly than Mr.
Obama has — to defer the deportations
of those who have strong bonds to the community through family and
work. She also promised to make conditions “more humane” for immigrant
detainees.
Mrs.
Clinton noted that her call for a citizenship path sets her apart from
any and all Republicans who are in, or likely to enter, the 2016 race.
The same is true of
her support for executive action. Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, a
former advocate of sensible reform, had the sense beaten out of him by
the Tea Party, and now seems to be seeking a vague provisional status
for the undocumented — a long, difficult path to
a temporary work permit. Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, has
been moderate in the past but is wobbly on citizenship, a nonstarter for
many in his party. Whether he supports it for some immigrants, and
which ones, under what conditions, is hard to pin
down on any given day; like other Republicans hoping to survive the
primaries, he is on his own tortuous path to a coherent position.
Like
Mr. Bush, Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky speaks compassionately of
immigrants at times, but his agenda seems limited to sealing the border
and ending the 14th Amendment
guarantee of citizenship by birth. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin just
wants every unauthorized immigrant to leave the country — and he wants
to limit legal immigration, too. It’s early in the campaign, and the
ground could always shift. Mrs. Clinton’s full-throated
public commitment to expansive immigration action, while surprising and
welcome, is only a few hours old. She may yet prove herself a staunch
defender of immigrants’ rights, but only last fall she was dodging
questions from the young advocates known as Dreamers
with a discouraging non-answer: “Elect more Democrats.”
A
shot at citizenship is the only proper goal of sensible immigration
reform. But even under the most generous and ambitious proposals,
immigrants won’t be able to reach
that goal for years, if ever. Creating a citizenship path requires
Congress to pass a bill, and there’s no sign when that will happen. “If
Congress refuses to act,” Mrs. Clinton vowed, “as president I will do
everything possible under the law to go even further.
There are more people — like many parents of Dreamers and others with
deep ties and contributions to our communities — who deserve a chance to
stay. I’ll fight for them, too.”
Those
are stirring words, but Mrs. Clinton has set no timetable for action
and given herself clear exits if things get sticky. “Under the law” is
one collision point,
as we see from the way hostile governors, attorneys general and a testy
judge in Texas have managed to stall Mr. Obama’s modest, and patently
legal, action to defer deportations. If Mrs. Clinton is going to expand
executive action, she is going to face a ferocious
fight from those who consider such a deed tyrannical, and insistence
from immigrant advocates that she protect as many people as possible.
While
Mrs. Clinton could protect Dreamers and their parents from deportation,
would she protect those with minor convictions or drunken-driving
arrests? It is arguably
far better for families, and the country, if many who have deep roots
here are allowed to stay, despite blots on their records — but that can
be a hard political argument to make. As for reforming the unjust
immigration detention system — an urgent mission,
one where Mr. Obama has failed — Mrs. Clinton will have to commit
serious resources and stronger will to accomplish that.
There
is a pressing need to lift the burden of fear and separation from
families, to unshackle workers who are chained to exploitive jobs by
fear of deportation. Mrs.
Clinton has shown that she understands this. But meanwhile, the
Republicans are stuck in the early 2000s, still talking of border
security and illegal invaders. They forget that the 11 million are on
this side of the border, and have children, and roots, and
jobs, and dreams, and their plight needs to be confronted. Here is a
tip: When you hear candidates talking about securing the border — a
border that is as secure as it’s ever going to get — that is the sign
that they are not interested in a serious conversation.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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