Has comprehensive immigration reform been a failure?

Has Obama failed at immigration reform? (essay plan)

The last time an essay question on immigration came up was in January 2013 and it's very likely it will come up this year given the fact that immigration reform has been in the news a lot lately and is still considered a hot topic in US politics, especially after Obama's executive order on immigration reform in November 2014. This is just a rough plan of some ideas you can include in your essay.

Failure	Not a failure	Conclusion
DEPORTED-IN-CHIEF. The press dubbed Obama as the deporter-in chief as the number of deportations under Obama exceeds that of his predecessor, by 2014 he had already deported 2 million illegals. The Obama administration seemed to have focused too much on deportations and not enough on passing bills on comprehensive immigration reform as they had initially pledged in 2008.	The deporter-in-chief is not accurate, given the fact that Obama once said that he is deporting “felons, not families” so his high number of deportations are justified and the deportation of criminals is a crucial aspect of comprehensive immigration reform for which Obama has been successful in as further illustrated by his work with Congress increase in spending on border protection, exceeding $17 billion in 2010.	However, this still continues to illustrate the Obama administrations failure given that although border spending rose, a bill failed to appear in Congress proposing reforming the immigration system. These may be good achievements but it’s not what he was hoping to achieve.
STATE LAWS. To emphasise the Obama administrations failure at immigration reform states have taken matters into their own hands. Some have gradually achieved what Obama failed to do, such as the California Dream Act (2011), which granted access to private colleges, scholarships and state schools to illegal immigrants and was primarily introduced because of Obama’s failure to implement the DREAM Act. Others have exploited Obama’s failure by passing some of the strictest anti-immigration bills most notably Arizona SB 1070 and Alabama HB 56 (‘reasonable suspicion’)	States have indeed resorted to passing their own laws, however, the defeat of the DREAM Act was not a consequence of Obama’s own failure but a consequence of an obstructionist Congress dominated by the GOP who have sought to oppose Democrat attempts at immigration reform. Also, Obama and the Justice Department have worked closely to strike down sections of Arizona’s law in US v. Arizona (2012), so attempts have been made at immigration reform.	However, only minor sections (3, 5(C) and 6) of Arizona’s state law have actually been struck down, large portions of it still remain intact and the fact the law remains is living proof that Obama has ultimately failed at living up to his key pledge of creating a fairer and more sensible immigration system.
WASTED 2 YEARS. During the first two years of the Obama administration Congress was a Democratic stronghold and comprehensive immigration bills were very likely. However, Obama decided to prioritise other issues such as a stimulus package and healthcare reform instead – this Obama acknowledged saying during his campaign for 2nd term “took up a huge amount of time in the first year”. This can be seen as a wasted opportunity and since then, no major attempts at reform have been made.	Although the Obama administration realised they had wasted time they did eventually introduce some extensive reforms, most notably Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) in 2012, which allowed immigrants who arrived before 2007 & their 16th birthday to be exempt from deportations.	DACA, although not a failure, is not a revolutionary reform and not as ‘comprehensive’ as Obama had initially been anticipating on – an estimated 1.7m illegal immigrants are eligible to its provisions, however, only 500k have actually benefited from it, thus illustrating it’s shortcomings.
GANG OF 8 & EXECUTIVE ORDER. The Gang of 8 Bill was introduced in 2013 and seemed like a brilliant bipartisanship bill proposing a path to citizenship. The bill passed the Senate but failed in the House. This was a bill that put immigration reform back on the legislative agenda; however, the Obama administration had failed to capitalize on its success in the House and failed to endorse it enough which eventually led to its downfall. Focused too much on gun control such as the Manchin-Toomey bill which was being debated around the same time.	However, the Gang of 8 bill was not Obama’s final attempt at immigration reform given the fact he passed an executive order following the 2014 midterm elections. The executive order will help 11 million illegal immigrants from deportation and is arguably, one of Obama’s most decisive actions towards achieving immigration reform, bringing millions ‘out of the shadows’ & ‘with our without Congress.’	Critics have pointed out that the executive order has given an impression of panic among the Obama administration knowing there’s two years remaining and not much has been achieved. The executive order arguably demonstrates Obama has failed sine he has had to resort to presidential action as all other attempts have failed and even the EO isn’t as ‘comprehensive’ as had been anticipated nor will it last, next President can override it.
OBAMA ADMITS IT. Even President Obama himself has acknowledged that his inability to implement his key pledge of a path to citizenship to undocumented immigrants is his own failure, saying that he was naïve for believing that the GOP (who were initially in favour of reform) would walk away from working with him on immigration reform. (During 2012 presidential campaign)	However, there is still to 2016 in which Obama still has time to enact change within the immigration system. The GOP have previously been very obstructionist towards immigration reform (DREA Act, Gang of 8) but have begun to realise its political significance and many have become more lenient on immigration reform. After 2012 the Republicans realised they cant win without reaching out to minority voters (only 27% Hispanics voted Romney) – commentators suggest GOP Pres can’t win 2016 without sensible immigration reform – Marco Rubio and Jeb Bush favour a path to citizenship, so there’s still some hope for close cooperation between Obama and GOP Congress.	Congress is dominated by the GOP and arguably, a conclusion on Obama’s immigration reform legacy can now be drawn considering the fact that it is unlikely he will pass anything through an increasingly polarised Congress.

Immigration Reform essay

AO1: 9   AO2: 10   AO3: 9   AO4: 8   36/45

Akif Rahman

Immigration is a hot topic in US politics at the moment due to recent executive orders and divides within Congress on how to deal with immigration. The Democrat Party has a set of key beliefs and one of those is social progression and helping minorities which is why it seems like the Obama administration, which has had 2 terms in power, should have had numerous successes in the field of immigration. Unfortunately, they haven’t; by looking at the increase in spending for border controls, the shunning of immigration reform in the first two years, the 2014 mid-terms and the shift in Congress, the fact that the Gang of 8 bill has not been furthered, the laws implemented by states and the lack of action on sanctuary cities, we can see the Obama administration has a record of total failure on immigration reform.

When Obama was elected, in 2008, he promised to tackle immigration and help those in the nation who wanted citizenship. This was contradicted by the rise in deportation and the rise in security spending. It is through these facts that we can see the Obama administration has not only failed on immigration reform , but it failed to help minorities which is one of their beliefs which is significant in realising that the party may have shifted on the spectrum. However, it is clear that attempts were made to make large reforms. In 2010 the Dream Act was proposed again. This shows that the administration have the mind set to progress on the topic of immigration. Unfortunately, this was filibustered by the Republicans which shows that the Obama administration had failed due to opposition. This could be a factor in the future too.

In the 2014 mid-term elections, the congress was handed over to the Republicans in the sense that they had the majorities in both the House and the Senate. This is significant because the Republican Party are very nationalist and traditional. Most of their supporters fear immigration and their politicians do too as seen in the filibuster in 2010. This shows that the Obama administration were not clinical enough in deciding what reforms to prioritise. However, the Republican Party are changing in their views. It is evident through politicians such as Marco Rubio and his Border Reform Act in 2013, the party were changing and this could be because of Obama’s push for immigration reform and the potential voting influence it may have in 2016. This therefore shows that Obama and his party have influenced changes elsewhere and shows that successes can be achieved through these means. Despite this, the reform proposed by Rubio was largely rejected in the party because many saw it as amnesty for immigrants. This shows the Obama administration has failed and cannot change views which suggest the idea that they should have taken their chance when they had it.

The first two years of Obama’s presidency seemed promising as there was a Democrat stronghold in Congress so reform would have been easy to pass, but Obama chose to focus elsewhere. The Obama administration decided that healthcare reform and the stimulus bill were their main priorities and so they shunned immigration reform. This shows that they not only failed to implement reform, but they simply did not care enough about it. Despite this, as time progressed, the party learnt and in their third year, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals was passed as executive action, which shows they knew they failed to act when they had a chance and that they wanted to progress now. Unfortunately, this was a bit too late and in hindsight, it seems the party would have had a lot more luck when they were actually in power with strength, which simply shows the administration were ineffective in implementing change.

In addition to this, we can see that the Obama administration is poor at progressing from change too. The Gang of 8 bill was passed in 2013 and seemed to revolutionise the immigration reform record as it seemed to be an amazing bill that created a path to citizenship. But since then, it has not been enhanced and when John Boehner brought it up in the House, many were not keen to enhance it. This shows that the Obama administration has a record of failure because even when they do pass reform, they are not effective at implementing it. However, we can see why Obama didn’t want to expand this bill; it is because there were plans in place for an executive order. In 2014, the executive order on immigration saved over 4 million people from deportation. This is significant because it shows the Obama administration is using their powers well in order to pursue action that will help their supporters. Nevertheless, this sees to be the only huge success of the administration. There have been failures to bring up reform like the Dream Act in 2010, and it all in all shows a record of failure. This is leading to states taking their own action.

Due to the government’s failure to create national reform, the states have taken the issue into their own hands in order to help immigrants. In 2012, California passed legislation that allowed farmers, who were immigrants, to join unions and protect their rights. This shows that the country sees immigration needs to be addressed but due to the failure to implement reform, they have had to take their own action. However, the National Supreme Court has fought against some state laws in order to protect immigrants for example in the Arizona V. USA case where the Supreme Court deemed the Arizona SB1070 law as unconstitutional because it implemented an ID card system. Obama spoke on this issue and called on Congress to create a national bill as these patchwork state laws were not the solution. Despite this, Obama has spoken on the matter, but has not got results yet which simply shows his administration has failed to implement reform on immigration and has also led to states not listening to executive orders.

Many politicians have called on Obama to do something about sanctuary cities which simply refuse to accept national laws in order to keep immigrant safe. This is detrimental to the lives of immigrants because they will simply be treated in ways that may not be right; it means with things such as the executive order in 2014, they won’t reap the benefits it brings. However, the Obama administration has done nothing to improve the lives of immigrants so it may seem better for them to have state law preside over national law. On the other hand, many have called immigration the new form of slavery and so there has to be action on immigration. This is simply saying that the issue is a vote winner and that the next election will be fought on this so it can be argued that the Obama administration has succeeded in bringing immigration into the limelight of US politics. However, it seems like the next president will be Republican (due to the results of the mid-terms) and therefore there may not be any chances in the future to have immigration reform and that the Obama administration has failed to act effectively.

To conclude, it is evident that the Obama administration has attempted to bring in immigration reform, such as the Dream Act and have actually been successful in their implementation of the executive order. However, this is simply not good enough from this government because it is expected and in fact was promised to be addressed and so the failure to implement legislation, and the shunning of the issue completely in the first two years as well as they failure to expand on laws passed shows that the Obama administration has a record of total failure on immigration reform.

Immigration Reform and Executive order

Immigration reform and executive order

FACT SHEET:

Immigration Accountability Executive Action
The President’s Immigration Accountability Executive Actions will help secure the border, hold nearly 5 million undocumented immigrants accountable, and ensure that everyone plays by the same rules. Acting within his legal authority, the President is taking an important step to fix our broken immigration system.

These executive actions crack down on illegal immigration at the border, prioritize deporting felons not families, and require certain undocumented immigrants to pass a criminal background check and pay their fair share of taxes as they register to temporarily stay in the U.S. without fear of deportation.
These are common sense steps, but only Congress can finish the job. As the President acts, he’ll continue to work with Congress on a comprehensive, bipartisan bill—like the one passed by the Senate more than a year ago—that can replace these actions and fix the whole system.
Three critical elements of the President’s executive actions are:

* Cracking Down on Illegal Immigration at the Border: The President’s actions increase the chances that anyone attempting to cross the border illegally will be caught and sent back. Continuing the surge of resources that effectively reduced the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border illegally this summer, the President’s actions will also centralize border security command-and-control to continue to crack down on illegal immigration.
* Deporting Felons, Not Families: The President’s actions focus on the deportation of people who threaten national security and public safety. He has directed immigration enforcement to place anyone suspected of terrorism, violent criminals, gang members, and recent border crossers at the top of the deportation priority list.
* Accountability – Criminal Background Checks and Taxes: The President is also acting to hold accountable those undocumented immigrants who have lived in the US for more than five years and are parents of U.S. citizens or Lawful Permanent Residents. By registering and passing criminal and national security background checks, millions of undocumented immigrants will start paying their fair share of taxes and temporarily stay in the U.S. without fear of deportation for three years at a time.

The President’s actions will also streamline legal immigration to boost our economy and will promote naturalization for those who qualify.

For more than a half century, every president—Democratic or Republican—has used his legal authority to act on immigration. President Obama is now taking another common sense step. As the Administration implements these executive actions, Congress should finish the job by passing a bill like the bipartisan Senate bill that: continues to strengthen border security by adding 20,000 more Border Patrol agents; cracks down on companies who hire undocumented workers; creates an earned path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants who pay a fine and taxes, pass a background check, learn English and go to the back of the line; and boosts our economy and keeps families together by cutting red tape to simplify our legal immigration process.

Federation for American Immigration (FAIR) are attempting to influence and go against Obama’s planned immigration reform. FAIR are attempting to lobby Congress to defund Executive Amnesty.