Hillary Tacks Left Of President Obama On Immigration

Hillary Rodham Clinton's speech on immigration changes the race. "On Tuesday, speaking to a group of DREAMers—unauthorized kids brought to the country as children—at a Nevada high school, she gave the same full-throated support to comprehensive immigration reform, going beyond President Obama—and activist expectations—to endorse changes to the immigration detention system, a path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants, protections for children brought to the country illegally, and an expansion of the president’s executive order, meant to keep millions of unauthorized immigrants from deportation and give millions more the right to apply for work permits and other documentation. ... Clinton is already well-positioned with Latino voters. By tacking to the left of the president—and essentially giving immigration activists their core demands—she moves closer to rebuilding the coalition that elected Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012." Slate

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YORK: How will the GOP field respond? "Rather than quickly condemn Clinton's new position, the two leading Republican presidential candidates most associated with immigration reform — Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio — said nothing at all about it... Clinton's move has made a big problem even bigger for Bush, Rubio, and the entire Republican Party. ... Her new position effectively trumps all other immigration reform offers on the table. Her message to Hispanic voters is: No Republican — not Jeb, not Marco, not anybody — will offer you as much as I will. The Republican response is unclear. Can Bush and Rubio say they share Clinton's goal of citizenship for millions of currently illegal immigrants but disagree with her way of getting there? That's not terribly strong. Do they stick with the 'legal status' that Clinton characterizes as 'second-class status'?" The Washington Examiner.

Clinton has the right policies. "A shot at citizenship is the only proper goal of sensible immigration reform. But even under the most generous and ambitious proposals, immigrants won’t be able to reach that goal for years, if ever. Creating a citizenship path requires Congress to pass a bill, and there’s no sign when that will happen. ... There is a pressing need to lift the burden of fear and separation from families, to unshackle workers who are chained to exploitive jobs by fear of deportation. Mrs. Clinton has shown that she understands this. But meanwhile, the Republicans are stuck in the early 2000s, still talking of border security and illegal invaders," observes the editorial board of The New York Times.