Rubio on Immigration

ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on August 28, 2012 when talking to Marco Rubio said - If Mitt Romney is going to win this race he needs to do better with Hispanic voters. Rubio’s reply was “I think we’re going to have to do better among all voters obviously, I think our message is one that appeals to all voters. Look, at the end of the day no community in America has been impacted more by the failures of this administration’s policies”. George said - Your Party has a platform that calls for the self deportation of 11 million illegal immigrants; Rubio said “Polices matter and look the Republican Party does have a challenge, we can’t just be the anti-illegal immigrant Party, we have to be the pro-legal immigrant Party and I think Mitt Romney has really done that.” George brought up Obama’s Executive Order (EO) that suspended the deportation of young immigrants that came with their parents and asked where Romney stood on it; Rubio replied “What he has said is, if he is President there will be a permanent solution to that problem that won’t require the short term one. The problems with the Executive Order are two-fold, number one – I think it has constitutional problems, it ignores the separation of powers.” George interrupted him and asked if Romney would rescind it; Rubio replied “I can’t speak on what he’s going to do with it – I think he’s going to replace it.”

The Republican platform stems from Romney’s comment during the December 10, 2011 debates – “We should register those that that are here and they should go home and get in line to come for permanent residency or citizenship.” On June 15 the Daily Caller's correspondent Neil Munro heckled the President during his announcement of the EO saying he was choosing foreigners over Americans; radio host Glenn Beck said the move was like that of a dictator; Romney didn’t disagree with the President but said he had a plan of his own. On June 18 Rubio said the President should have worked with Congress to deal with immigration, he had his own version of the Dream Act (not the same as Romney’s) and no one in Washington had contacted him but his message is - They come for a better life for their children. On June 26 Romney was asked on Face the Nation about the EO and he only said he’d look at it. You would think 11 days would have been enough to know if he’d repeal it or not or at least go into the plan he said he had. On August 14 when the EO went into effect Republicans said it’s no surprise it came out right before the election. I’ll get to Jeb Bush’s comments.