As if he did not have enough on his plate already for the first year of his Presidency, President Obama indicated today that he wanted to tackle what seems like an intractable problem–immigration– particularly the estimated 12 million illegal immigrants that live within our country.
He seems ready to pursue a bill similar to the one proposed by President Bush and backed in its details by Senators John McCain and Ted Kennedy, but gaining great opposition in 2007 and failing to pass.
This bill would provide for illegal immigrants (undocumented workers) to pay a penalty and back taxes, be required to learn English, and to go to the "back of the pack" behind those immigrants who played by the rules and came into the country legally. This would be combined with greater border security, and enforcement measures for a "temporary worker" program.
The chances for passage of such a series of measures seems doubtful, but again, Obama is not missing a beat in pursuing all of the goals he set forth during his Presidential campaign in 2008. It will be interesting to see if he can overcome what I call the "Tom Tancredo" lobby, which is vehemently opposed to any so called "amnesty" of illegal immigrants and any temporary worker program. Tancredo, of course, is the former Colorado Congressman who was one of the many GOP candidates for the Presidential nomination of 2008, and has come out vehemently against the nomination of Hispanic judge Sonia Sotomayor for the Supreme Court. It is likely the sparks will fly on this issue when and if it comes up for debate in both houses of Congress.