By Hayley Peterson Washington Examiner.
Texas Insider Report: WASHINGTON D.C. Facing an election-year backlash from Hispanic voters President Obama put on hold the deportation of up to 300000 illegal immigrants who have been rounded up by local police and turned over to the federal government under a program Obama instituted.
Obama called for individual reviews of 300000 deportation cases and ordered that any cases involving children or immigrants who had not committed violent crimes -- the original target of his immigration enforcement program -- be suspended.
The administrations announcement follows increasing criticism from the Hispanic community of the presidents aggressive deportation policies which led to the removal of nearly 1 million immigrants over the last two years. No other president has overseen that many deportations.
I think the president understands that he is in considerable trouble with his base all-around said Allert Brown-Gort director of the University of Notre Dames Institute for Latino Studies.
Quite clearly this announcement comes as a result of understanding that Latinos are becoming ever more important ... particularly in battleground states such as Colorado and New Mexico.
Obama won a record number of Hispanic votes in 2008 by promising to press for comprehensive immigration reform including creating a path to citizenship for many of the 11 million illegal immigrants already living in the United States.
But in his first two years in office Obama has offered only a far more modest immigration proposal the so-called Dream Act which would have given citizenship to younger illegal immigrants who attended college or joined the
military. Yet even that proposal failed in Congress -- even when Obamas fellow Democrats controlled it.
Our borders remain porous. We have a defective departure system in place. We have 11 million people without the authority to be here said Michael Wildes an immigration lawyer and well-known Democratic fundraiser. And the president is going to point to 300000 immigrants and go easy on them?
He said Obama has far more work to do on immigration reform.
This is tantamount to putting a Band-Aid on a cancer he said. Loosening the reins on nonviolent children while thoughtful and appropriate is merely a Band-Aid.
Brown-Gort said the policy change is a good step but that the Hispanic community is beginning to doubt whether the president will follow through.
He talks about being our friend and yet underground under his watch his people are very very busy deporting everybody Brown-Gort said.
Hispanic voters are vital to Obamas re-election efforts. He won 67 percent of their votes in 2008 but his approval rating among Hispanics has fallen to 51 percent according to the latest Gallup poll.
Meanwhile the Hispanic population is growing faster than any other group in the nation accounting for more than 16 percent of the U.S. population according to the Census Bureau.
Brown-Gort said its unlikely that Hispanics will vote for a Republican over Obama in the 2012 presidential election -- although he noted that Texas Gov. Rick Perry did sign into law a bill that grants in-state tuition to undocumented students.
The problem for Obama is that they are not going to show up and vote -- at all he said.
Hayley Peterson is Staff Writer for the Washington Examiner.
