Immigration and the Presidential Debate

 Despite immigration’s impact on the social, economic, and political institutions in this country, the issue has been glaringly and depressingly absent from public and elite discourse during this 2012 presidential campaign.  It was refreshing that a question on the topic made it into last night’s debate when Lorraine Osario asked: “What do you plan on doing with immigrant without their green cards that are currently living here as productive members of society?”

Governor Romney began by connecting his own history to one of immigrants as he did at the Republican National Convention, citing his father’s birth in Mexico to American parents and his wife’s father’s birth in Wales, and reiterating his support for legal immigration.  “I want out legal system to work better.  I want it to be streamlined,” Romney said, citing the challenges of navigating the federal government’s confusing immigration bureaucracy.

Romney took a predictably hard position on immigrants who entered the country without proper authorization or currently reside here without documentation, notably using “legal,” “legally,” and “illegally” 20 times throughout the entire exchange (at one point he caught himself saying “undocumented,” and quickly replaced it with “illegal”).  He would discourage illegal immigration, he said, by refusing to grant amnesty, a dirty word in Republican circles, putting in place an E-Verify system to verify the immigration statuses of employees, and by removing magnets like driver’s licenses for those without documentation.  Surprisingly, Romney didn’t address the border fence with Mexico, an issue that dominated immigration debates throughout most of the 2000s and that Republicans had a clear advantage on tough enforcement and border security.

Expanding legal immigration was not off bounds for the Governor.  He suggested, as he has before on the stump and on his website, that immigrants who graduate from top universities with degrees in science and math should get a green card stapled to their diploma, a plan championed by congressional Republicans but that failed in the House earlier this Fall.  He also championed a DREAM Act-lite, one that would offer “those that came here illegally…a pathway to become a permanent resident” through military service, though was sparse on other details.

The Governor concluded his answer by tying President Obama to his broken promise to pass immigration reform in the first year of his first term, despite the fact that he had a supermajority in the Senate and the House.

The President, who enjoys a 44 point advantage over Romney with Latino voters, began his answer in much the same way as the Governor with his support for a streamlined immigration system that reduces the backlog and makes it “easier, simpler, and cheaper for people who are waiting in line, obeying to law,” to come to the United States.

Addressing the record number of deportations that have happened during his tenure, a major weakness with Latino voters, President Obama reiterated his support for the selective deportations of “criminals, gang bangers who are hurting the community,” and not for honest individuals “trying to feed their families,” and undocumented students (DREAMers), a group he was able to appeal to with the deferred action plan the President announced this summer that blocked deportation and issues work authorization for qualified individuals.

President Obama didn’t hesitate to hit back at Governor Romney on his vow to veto the Dream Act, his support for making life “so miserable on folks that they’ll leave,” and for the Governor’s support for Arizona’s infamously punitive SB1070.  The President accused Mitt Romney of saying that SB1070 should be a “model” for the nation, though Romney and fact-checkers swiftly pointed out that he was referring to a different law when making that remark.  

In one last rebuttal, the Governor again addressed the President’s failed promise to pass comprehensive immigration reform in the first year of his tenure and clarified his remarks on self-deportation, stressing that he was “not in favor of rounding up people…and taking them out of our country.”  The President responded by simply pointing out that Governor Romney’s top advisor on immigration, Kris Kobach, is the “guy who designed the Arizona law, the entirety of it – not E-Verify, the whole thing.”

(*this is a draft that has been adapted by Sayu to be published on National Journal later on).