Obama: I Didn't Promise to Complete Immigration Reform in my First Term

[Admin 174]

President Barack Obama said Thursday in an exclusive interview with Agencia Efe, Spain's international news agency, that he had not promised to complete his entire 2008 campaign agenda, including immigration reform, during his first term but rather had said that he would begin working on it.

When asked if he regretted not having been able to deliver on immigration reform, the president responded: "No, because what a president does, or what a candidate for president does is you lay out an agenda of where you want to take your country, a vision for how we would strengthen the country and, in my case, my vision has always been how do we create a strong middle class, ladders of opportunity into the middle class."

"And the agenda that I put forward," he said, "is one that is designed to make sure that anybody who works hard in this country can make it."

Success can be achieved by people in the United States "regardless of race, religion, background," and they can "have access to a good education, ... they can get the skills they need, ... they can find a job that pays the bills, they can own a home, send their kids to college," he said.

During the interview, which the president granted after holding a campaign rally in Golden, Colorado, he also said that "if you look at the promises that I made back in 2008, we have achieved many of them."

"(We) ended the war in Iraq, saved an auto industry on the brink of extinction, passed comprehensive health care reform which will provide millions ... more people (with) access to health insurance, including nine million Latinos who work so hard and have difficulty getting health insurance on the job, reforming our student loans program so that millions ... more young people are able to get the support that they need."

He acknowledged that "there are some things, like comprehensive immigration reform, that we have not got done yet. But in 2008 I didn't promise that I would have everything completed by the end of the first term. I said that we would begin work on all these things."

The president also expressed confidence that the agenda that he has presented recently, with the aim of being reelected in November, includes objectives "that we can accomplish."

In 2008 then Senator Obama said he would make immigration reform a "top priority" of his first term as President promising to do it his first year of his first term.

"We can't wait 20 years from now to do it, we can't 10 years from now to do it, we need to do it by the end of my first term as president of the United States of America," Obama said in 2008.

Obama made a similar promise to try for immigration reform in the first year of his second term in an interview with Univision. Obama blamed Republicans for the lack of progress on reform legislation in his first term and pledged he would “try” to bring up the issue in the first year of a second term.

Among those realizable goals, Mr. Obama said, are: "bringing ... manufacturing jobs back home, making college more affordable, continu(ing) to reform our schools, rehiring teachers so that we don't have overcrowded classrooms, continuing to develop clean energy that reduces our dependence on foreign oil, ending the war in Afghanistan, these are all things that we can accomplish."

"It's in stark contrast to the agenda that's being presented by the other side," the president said, alluding to the campaign platform of his Republican rival, Mitt Romney.

Read more: http://latino.foxnew.../#ixzz26Tera922

[JoseG 383]

This time around he didn't even mention Immigration reform or the Dream act in his DNC speech. Uh-oh.

What is he going to say if he wins the election? That he didn't even mention it?

Yeah it's great that we got Deferred Action, what sucks is that he only did it to win back the Latino vote after he had lost them by deporting 400K illegal immigrants in 2011 alone! If he really wanted to help us, he could have ordered Deferred Action since the beginning of his term, then work on passing the Dream act. Not the other way around.

It would have probably been even easier to pass the Dream act if we were all already here lawfully instead of trying to pass the Dream act while we were illegal immigrants, but of course that was never his concern. We were left hanging for 4 years.

What an ass.....

[MydreamRN 5]

I believe the republicans had a lo to do with not passing the dream act! And what the president did on June 15 2012 was remarkable... Yeah like you said he could have done it to win Latino voters back but maybe he did it just in case he didn't win in November cus Romney would have never granted deferred action to dreamers or pass the dream act he doesn't even care about immigration and he's pro self deportation so! Thank you so much mr. Obama this is the first step to something bigger! I know many will rather take this opportunity than live in the shadows... I can belive u called call mr. Obama an ass when all he did was help dreamers out of the shadows... Just look how fast everything is moving along less than a month and 29 dreamers have been granted deferred action.

[JoseG 383]

You do know that Romney can end Deferred Action the moment he becomes president right? It's not a permanent fix, it's just temporary enough to get Obama the votes he needs. Like I said, if he cared so much about the Dreamers, he could have ordered Deferred Action since the beginning. Why didn't he do that? Why did he wait four years "trying" for something that obviously wasn't going to pass because the majority in the Senate didn't approve of? If he cared about Immigration why did he split up families by deporting about 39K people a month since he took office?

Sure, he says he was for immigration reform and for the Dream act, what does that mean? That means that if the Dream Act somehow got to his desk to sign it, he would. Until then, keep deporting.

You have to look past the smoke screen, don't be fooled so easily. At least Romney is truthful about it.

[MydreamRN 5]

I know but it could end if Romney wins or if obama wins but let's be practical here can that really happen? looke at history like the TPS... DREAMers are people who have no criminal history and all they want is to get ahed in life and wont take EAD for granted! In two years when is time to renew it let's prove the government they did the right thing by giving dreamers the EAD get an education be a good citizen do as much as u can in two years and fight for the dream act a path to citizenship.... It's possible

[JoseG 383]

Of course, I agree with you that we should make the best of it and show that we deserve to be here. I just don't like the reason for why Obama ordered Deferred Action and him basically saying not to be blamed for not completing Immigration reform because he never "promised" it.

That to me is like a child going back on their word and saying "Nu-uh! I didn't say I promise"

[MydreamRN 5]

LOLl I know right... Well it is what it is..it wasn't when we wanted it but when we least expected it... . And it's very sad all the people who got deported I put myself in their shoes and I feel their pain...