Obama argues immigrants benefit the economy and that the border is more secure than ever. Obama pushes immigration overhaul

EL PASO, Texas — President Barack Obama Tuesday challenged lawmakers to enact immigration reform, declaring that immigrants benefit the U.S. economy and that the border is more secure than ever.

“The question is whether those in Congress who previously walked away in the name of enforcement are now ready to come back to the table and finish the work that we’ve started,” Obama told about 900 people at an outdoor speech under a dry, baking sun. “We’ve got to put the politics aside.”


Obama’s Texas trip had its own political overtones: Beyond trying to reframe the immigration debate, the president’s visit aimed to shore up Hispanic support on the border ahead of two Democratic Party fundraisers in Austin.

“We’re here at the border today because we also recognize that being a nation of laws goes hand-in-hand with being a nation of immigrants,” Obama said at Chamizal National Memorial park, a dusty outpost on the bluffs of the Rio Grande named for a century-long border dispute. Obama made his now-familiar moral argument for immigration reform and reiterated his proposals: provide a path to citizenship, secure the borders, improve the existing immigration system and crack down on employers who exploit illegal workers.

The administration is trying to make the case that Obama’s leadership has improved border security and resulted in fewer attempts at illegal entry, meeting the demands of some Republican opponents of immigration reform.

“We have gone above and beyond what was requested by the very Republicans who said they supported broader reform as long as we got serious about enforcement,” Obama said. “Maybe (next) they’ll say we need a moat. Or alligators in the moat.”

Obama also is hitting hard the argument that immigrants, with their hard work and entrepreneurship, are a boon to the U.S. economy. Intel, Google, Yahoo and eBay all were founded by immigrants, Obama noted.

He stressed that some bipartisan support for comprehensive reform already exists — including from conservative media mogul Rupert Murdoch.

“That’s Rupert Murdoch, the owner of Fox News and an immigrant himself,” Obama said. “I don’t know if you’re familiar with his views, but let’s just say he doesn’t have an Obama bumper sticker on his car.”

Yet Obama’s efforts to reshape a familiar issue to make it more appealing on economic and law enforcement grounds isn’t likely to persuade lawmakers to overhaul immigration policy before the 2012 election.

Republicans, including Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, have challenged the urgency for immigration reform, saying that fixing the economy must come first. Increasingly, Obama’s demand for a civil dialogue on the issue is becoming a monologue — because his opponents decline to engage him.

“I think people believe Obama would like to push the immigration issue, but I don’t think that is going to be possible,” said Cal Jillson, a political scientist at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. “As a practical matter, this set of issues is not going to move until after the election, and then only if the Democrats have a good cycle in 2012.”

The White House, meanwhile, has become increasingly sensitive to skepticism by some conservative pundits and others who describe the president’s latest reform push as a pander to Hispanic voters.

“He feels that he was hired to try to do some hard things, and he’s going to try to do them,” White House press secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday.

Asked why, if immigration reform is such a priority, it took more than two years for Obama to visit the border, Carney said, “there have been quite a few things going on,” including the economic downturn and the capture of Osama bin Laden.

Obama’s visit to the El Paso area was shaded by the eerie overtones of the still-roiling drug war just over the border in Ciudad Juarez.

There, the violent drug trade that Mexican officials blame in large part on the U.S. market has claimed more than 8,000 lives in the past three years, even as the violent crime rate in El Paso has gone down.