President Barack Obama is seeking to build on the growing political momentum to implement sweeping revisions to the immigration law in the United States, cautiously endorsing a new Senate blueprint and offering some more details about his own plan.
Speaking at a Las Vegas event that was designed to highlight the growing voting power of the Hispanic community, Obama wasted no time in urging lawmakers to press ahead with the quick passing of comprehensive immigration reform legislation. This would include tighter border security as well as a pathway to US citizenship to the approximately 11 million illegal immigrants currently living in the United States, as well as a system to help expand the amount of legal immigrant workers.
“The time has come for common sense, comprehensive immigration reform,” Obama told the enthusiastic audience at Las Vegas’ Del Sol High School, where two thirds of the student body are Hispanic. “We can’t allow immigration reform to get bogged down in endless debate.”
Obama’s appearance is just the beginning of a public campaign designed to bolster support in an issue which has been left languishing in Congress for many years now. The 2012 election, in which 71 percent of the Hispanic voting community supported the President, has resulted in a change of the political climate for both Democrats and Republicans in Congress. “For the first time in many years, Republicans and Democrats seem ready to tackle this problem together,” Obama says. “At the moment, it looks like there’s a genuine desire to get this done.”