Immigration advocates press Obama
President Barack Obama heads to Texas Tuesday toting a pledge to jump-start work on a comprehensive immigration bill - a long-awaited, never-attained goal of a Hispanic community that is crucial to Obama's hopes of winning key southwestern states in 2012.
Are they cheering his newfound commitment to the goal? Hardly.
Many top Hispanic activists say Obama's commitment to a bill is welcomed, but too little, too late, and they'd rather he put just as much effort into actions he can do with the stroke of his pen - such as slowing the deportations of certain illegal immigrants.
"We all understand the importance of the legislative process and that we need a bipartisan bill in the long run, but that will take a long time and given the gridlock in Washington, has an uncertain payoff," Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.) said Monday. "Immigrant communities need help now, our system is broken now, and the president can do something about it now."
Obama's speech in El Paso, Texas, will be the centerpiece of the president's latest push for a reform bill, but he's battling deep skepticism among those most likely to appreciate the renewed effort, which has involved three White House meetings in the past three weeks and multiple mentions by the president of the need for reform.
When Obama summoned more than 50 heavy hitters in politics, business and law enforcement to the White House last month to enlist their help on the bill, they surprised him by insisting that Obama needed to do more with his executive power to slow the deportations of illegal immigrants such as college students.
The disconnect between Obama and many in the State Dining Room points up the president's challenge.
Not only is Obama resisting requests to use his executive power, but there also is no evidence the administration has a legislative strategy to pass a bill through Congress. That has left many to question Obama's motives: Is he really serious this time, or is he just checking a political box ahead of the 2012 election?
Democratic lawmakers, labor unions and immigrant advocacy groups are pressing Obama to halt deportations of young illegal immigrants who would qualify for the DREAM Act, a bill to legalize students and military members who were brought to the United States by their parents. It passed the House last year but fell five votes short in the Senate. They also want to expand waivers for illegal immigrants who are immediate relatives of U.S. citizens to give them legal status.
So far, the president has refused to act, saying the administration will not circumvent Congress. The administration is shifting the focus of its deportation efforts toward serious criminals, but the only way to fix the system is through passage of a bipartisan bill, White House aides say.
"I know some here wish that I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself," Obama said during a commencement address last month at Miami Dade College. "But that's not how democracy works. See, democracy is hard. But it's right. Changing our laws means doing the hard work of changing minds and changing votes, one by one."
In a bid to lure Republicans back to the negotiating table on immigration, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and others have gone out of their way to tout the administration's border enforcement efforts and high number of deportations. Any attempt to protect categories of illegal immigrants by administrative order - "backdoor amnesty," as Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) calls it - could backfire politically, thwarting a legislative solution or even resulting in the loss of administrative powers under a Republican-controlled Congress, according to people familiar with the administration's thinking.
It's an infuriating stance to the Hispanic immigrant community, which has seen a record number of deportations - nearly 400,000 in each of the past two years, more than under the Bush administration.
"It is just not possible to a have a deep and meaningful conversation on immigration without the power of the presidency coming up," said Clarissa Martinez, director of immigration and national campaigns for National Council of La Raza. "It is imperative, and we welcome that the administration is trying to build the space for legislative reform, but the power of the presidency needs to be brought to bear."
The issue is "top of mind" in the Hispanic community, said Angela Kelley, vice president for immigration policy and advocacy at the Center for American Progress, a liberal think tank.
"Rather than just talk about the policies he would like to see happen, he needs to be responsive to the policies that he can make happen," Kelley said. "He can't pass a bill. But he is answerable to all the expanded enforcement actions and to the question people ask: Could you take the edge off enforcement?"
Gutierrez said he will be listening for the president to address the issue Tuesday. But he may be left wanting.
Senior administration officials who previewed the speech Monday suggested the president would focus on border enforcement and the economic benefits of immigration.
The latest White House push also has been met with doubts on Capitol Hill.
"I just haven't seen the outreach to offices on how to work together," said a senior House Republican aide who has worked on comprehensive immigration reform. "We have never seen anything followed through other than these public meetings. I just wonder where this work is that they're doing."
A spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio), Brendan Buck, said the White House hasn't contacted the speaker's office or the House Judiciary Committee to talk about the issue.
"Frankly, we've had no indication from the White House that immigration reform is a priority for them," Buck said.
For their part, White House aides say the president isn't focused immediately or directly on Congress.
Rather, he is building the pressure on Congress from the outside, giving beyond-the-Beltway speeches and meeting with Hispanic media personalities and actresses, business leaders and political titans such as Michael Bloomberg and Arnold Schwarzenegger.
"This is an important part of the campaign to build public awareness and public support for comprehensive immigration reform, which we have to do to make sure that it's got the kind of momentum behind it that gets Congress' attention," White House press secretary Jay Carney said Monday.
That's all well and good, reform proponents say, but it's no longer enough.
At a meeting last week with the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, Obama got pressed on the issue. And at the sitdown with business, political, law enforcement, religious and civil rights figures in the State Dining Room, he got an earful, as well.
More than half the questions focused on Obama's executive authority, "which is kind of surprising given who was in the room," said Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, an attendee at the meeting.
By the time John Podesta, president and CEO of the Center for American Progress, raised the issue, Obama gave some ground.
He told the group that he would sit down with Napolitano for a "serious conversation," Noorani said.
"He realizes he can't brush it off," he said.