The President’s “misspeaking” on his Obama Care
pledges have doomed any chance of immigration reform, or any other major
reform, for that matter. Obama may go into campaign mode on immigration
reform to gain Hispanic votes, but it will be only talk. There can be
no comprehensive reform of anything – immigration, entitlements, or the
national debt — if legislators and, more importantly, the voters do not
trust the President’s word.
Obama has declared immigration reform his top
legislative priority for the rest of his term. In June of 2012, the
Senate passed the Border Security,
Economic Opportunity, and Immigration Modernization Act, which spends
more on border security, provides provisional legal status and eventual
pathway to citizenship for people living in the country illegally, and
outlines reforms for the existing visa programs for immediate relatives
and skilled workers.
House Speaker John Boehner
declared the Senate bill a nonstarter and expressed hope that the House
would produce its own bill. A House bi-partisan group of four
Republicans and four Democrats began drafting such a plan but has
subsequently fallen apart with only one Republican remaining. The
chances of passage of any comprehensive immigration reform during the
Obama years are about zero.
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