When it comes to the 2016 presidential election, the one constant for both Democratic and Republican nomination candidates is the controversy surrounding their stance on illegal immigration, regardless of what this stance might be. Donald Trump’s plan to deal with the issue has caused further heated debate; however, unlike many Republican candidates who have gone further to the right as a result of Trump’s policies, and his popularity, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee says his position is exactly the same as it has always been.
In an interview on Fox News Sunday, Huckabee insisted that his plan to “secure the border first, don’t provide amnesty, but don’t be irrational” has not changed in the slightest; however, back in 2006 Huckabee was quoted in the Washington Post as saying that offering people a pathway to US citizenship was the rational thing to do and he also advocated for financial assistance to be given to undocumented immigrants who attended in-state colleges while he was Governor of Arkansas.
The issue has continued to divide opinion, particularly in the Republican Party in the wake of Donald Trump’s fiery comments and even more explosive detailed immigration plan; however, the controversy has been boiling for some time, with a lengthy campaign in favor of immigration reform and then President Obama’s contentious executive action last November.
Huckabee says that people do not hate immigrants in and of themselves; instead, they are frightened of mass immigration destroying their way of life. “They see their jobs disappearing, going to Mexico, to China, to Indonesia,” he claims. “If we deal with the real, acute problems, the immigration problem is not going to be as acute.”