World Hot Topics Blog
Romney Wont Take Away Obama Visas for Illegal
Immigrant Kids
DENVER – Mitt Romney says he will
not take away the two-year visas given to children of illegal immigrants under
an executive order by President Obama earlier this year, despite having called
the measure a politically-motivated “stop gap” at the time.
“The people who have received the
special visa that the president has put in place, which is a two-year visa,
should expect that the visa would continue to be valid,” Romney said in an
interview with the Denver Post.
“I’m not going to take something
that they’ve purchased,” Romney told the paper. “Before those visas have
expired we will have the full immigration reform plan that I’ve proposed.”
This appears to be a further
softening of the Republican nominee’s immigration stance, which has gone from
promoting an idea of “self-deportation” to one that is less aggressive. Last
month at a Univision “Meet the Candidates” forum in Miami Romney said that he
wasn’t going to “round up people around the country and deport them.”
But even then, Romney criticized
Obama’s executive order announced in June, which stopped the deportation of as
many as 800,000 young people who had lived a crime-free life in the U.S. for
five straight years and instead allowed them to apply for a these two-year
visas that could be renewed.
Tune in to ABCNews.com on Wednesday
for livestreaming coverage of the first 2012 Presidential Debate from Denver,
Colo. Coverage kicks off with ABC News’ live preview show at noon, and full
debate coverage begins at 8 p.m.
Speaking at the Univision forum last
month, Romney derided Obama’s executive order, saying, “With a few months
before an election he puts in place something that is temporary, which does not
solve this issue. I will solve it in a permanent basis consistent with those
principles.”
A campaign official today said
Romney’s remarks to the Post were consistent with his messaging, saying Romney
has always said he would replace the president’s executive order with his own
permanent reforms and that his remarks to the Denver Post are in line with
that.
Romney will not reverse the visas,
but before they are expired his own more permanent reforms will be in place,
the official said.
When Obama issued his executive
order, Romney told New Hampshire television station WMUR that he believed the
executive order was an election year ploy to garner support from Hispanic
voters by the president. “He didn’t deal with it at a time when he had the
ability to put into place say long term solutions,” Romney said. “And now he’s
putting into place a stop gap idea and we’ll see how that works out, but my
guess is what we really need to have, if I’m president, is a long term solution
to this and other issues that relate to immigration.”
When later pressed on whether he
would reverse Obama’s order, Romney turned to get on his campaign bus and
ignored the question.
In the following week Romney again
refused to say whether he’d reverse the order. “Some people have asked if I
will let stand the president’s executive action. The answer is that I will put
in place my own long-term solution that will replace and supersede the
president’s temporary measure,” Romney said at the National Association of Latino
Elected and Appointed Officials, adding that he “won’t settle for a stop-gap
measure.”
World Hot Topics Blog
Issue of Illegal Immigration Took
Center Stage During GOP Primary
During the Republican primary,
Romney said that he would veto the Dream Act
— which would allow some illegal immigrants meeting certain criteria to have
permanent residency – if he was elected, but maintained that he would
allow for one of the proposal’s provisions that allows servicemen and women to
gain permanent residency in the U.S.
And in a series of debates that
included Texas Gov. Rick Perry, Romney went head-to-head on the idea of
allowing illegal immigrants to benefit from in-state tuition rates.
Perry accused Romney of “not having
a heart,” while Romney countered that believing illegal immigrants should not
get less expensive education than those here legally means “you have a heart
and a brain.”
Romney has since gone on to promote
his idea of an e-verify system, rather than his self-deportation remarks, that
would allow employers to be sure the workers they are hiring are in the country
legally.
Update at 10:58 a.m. ET – President Obama’s campaign released the following
statement from Director of Hispanic Press Gabriela Domenzain in reaction to
Mitt Romney’s latest comments regarding deferred action for the kids off
illegal immigrants:
“Romney’s latest immigration pivot
raises more questions than it answers. He still has not said whether he would
continue the Administration’s policy that provides a temporary reprieve from
deportation for young people who were brought here through no fault of their
own. Would he side with his extreme anti-immigration advisors and repeal this
measure? What would he do with those who qualify for deferred action but
haven’t received it? Would he deport those who have received a deferment when
the program expires after two years? We know he called the DREAM Act a
‘handout’ and that he promised to veto it — nothing he has said since
contradicts this and we should continue to take him at his word.”
This World Hot Topics Blog
is Originally from here :
Romney Won’t Take Away Obama Visas for Illegal
Immigrant Kids
http:// abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/10/romney-wont-take-away-obama-visas-for-illegal-immigrant-kids/
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