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COMPREHENSIVE IMMIGRATION REFORM LET'S GO

In 2013, the Senate passed a bipartisan comprehensive immigration reform bill that would have strengthened our communities, our economy, and our country's future. Representatives from both sides of the aisle have voiced their support for comprehensive immigration reform, and Americans across the country havent wavered. And yet, House Speaker John Boehner and House leadership refused to even bring the bill up for a vote.

That's why President Obama is taking action where he can to help fix our broken immigration system, strengthen our economy, and protect our communities and families.

The President's executive actions will give parents of American citizens or legal resident children who have lived in the U.S. for more than five years relief from deportation if they register with the government, undergo background checks, and pay taxes. It will also allow immigration enforcement officials to focus resources on deporting felons, not families.

These actions to help reform our immigration system will strengthen our country, grow our economy by up to $210 billion in ten years, and could shrink the federal deficit by up to $25 billion over the next decade.

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Comprehensive Immigration Reform - Organizing for Action

From Hillary Clintons Nevada speech in favor of immigration reform to Jeb Bushs unwavering support for it, every presidential candidate in both parties is busy staking out a position on immigration.

The trouble is theyre using the same shopworn talking points theyve always used. Rehashing the same arguments in front of a Congress that has repeatedly rejected them isnt going to work. New reform ideas are needed.

Every immigration reform bill since 2002 has failed partly because they were essentially the same. They have all included the same three broad ideas: increase immigration enforcement, legalize some unauthorized immigrants, and liberalize legal immigration.

The first new idea is the merit-based green card category that was pushed by Sen. Marco Rubio in 2013 and promptly forgotten. That category would have issued up to 250,000 new green cards a year, half of them set aside for mid-skilled workers while the rest were for workers who possess skills like English or computer programming.

New ideas are out there. The question is whether Washington will take advantage of them.

Allowing mid-skilled immigrants to even apply for green cards was so revolutionary and appealed to traditional American views of fairness in the immigration system that this reform was overlooked. Its still a fresh idea that American voters, congressmen and senators havent seriously considered.

Another new idea is to reduce the role of the federal government by allowing states to create their own guest worker visa programs if they wish. American states have provided a democratic laboratory to test different policies like welfare reform, gun laws and tax policies with some clear winners emerging. Why not apply that to immigration?

States could design migrant worker visas for any skill level for any occupation, entrepreneurs, investors, or those who want to buy real estate in blighted cities. Congress can then compare the outcomes among different states and choose the best policies based on experience. Or if the state system works even better than predicted, Congress could permanently hand guest workers over to the states.

America wouldnt be stepping into the unknown here. Both Canada and Australia have their own provincial and state-based migration systems. According to a recent Cato Institute policy analysis, those systems are more responsive to local labor market demands than a one-size-fits-all federal program.

But state-based visas arent just a foreign idea. Since 2008, at least nine U.S. states have proposed to manage their own guest worker visa program including every state that borders Mexico. This year both Texas and California are considering bills to ask the federal government for permission to experiment with different pilot programs of their own design. The federal government should allow states to run their own migration systems.

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Take Immigration Reform Past Talking Points | Cato Institute

If Marco Rubio becomes the first Latino president, it wont be because of the Latino vote. The Republican senator from Floridaalienated many Latinos when he abandoned immigration reform in 2013, and the ones still in his corner dont make up enough of the electorate to make a difference. Coupled with his stances against President Barack Obamas health care law and the Obama administrations executive actions on immigration -- two issues both highly popular with Latinos -- Rubio has the same problem as his Republican rivals: Winning the Latino vote wont be easy.

Rubios challenges were on display Monday, when he formally announced he was running for president. While giving his speech from the Freedom Tower in Miami, a group composed of young illegal immigrants known as Dreamers and other Latino advocates protestedoutside by shouting, What about my family? Rubios dream is our nightmare!" Rubio also faced hecklers angry over his immigration policies on his recent book tour.

"What we have seen is that he's actually turned his back on the Latino community," said Cristina Jimenez, managing director of United We Dream, one of the groups that protested Monday. "It's very clear who's standing with our community and who's not."

Latino voter turnout for then-candidate Barack Obama in 2008 and during his re-election in 2012 propelled him to the White House -- he won roughly 70 percent of the Hispanic vote in both years. Although he didnt get a majority of the Latino vote in 2004, President George W. Bushs re-election was due in part to garnering 44 percent of the Latino vote. By contrast, 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney got only27 percent of the Latino vote.

Theres too much animosity from the Republican Party toward the Latinos, and in order for that to change you cant just run a Latino last name, said Norma Ruiz Guerrero, founder of Memes Media, a New York political advertising firm that helps candidates craft their message to Latino voters. His last name should be Smith, really, she said of Rubio. Hes not anything like the majority of Latinos in this country.

Rubio has a negative net favorability rating among Latinos who voted in the 2014 midterm elections, according to a survey conducted by the polling firm Latino Decisions. Only 31 percent of Latino voters had a favorable view of the Florida senator, while 36 percent held an unfavorable opinion. About a third either had no opinion of Rubio or had never heard of him.

The main factors driving Rubios unpopularity in the Latino community are his about-face on immigration reform and his opposition to Obamas executive actions on immigration. He was one of the so-called Gang of Eight senators who pushed for immigration reform that would have allowed a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants until the plan was killed by the House. Rubio has since said the big bill was a mistake and reform should be done in piecemeal, first through legislation to secure the border.

Thats his Achilles' heel, said Luis Alvarado, a Republican strategist with California consulting firm Revolvis. That will continue to resound until Election Day with all Latinos, and they will make him pay for that.

About two-thirds to three-fourths of Latinos favor less restrictive immigration policies and pathways to citizenship, saysJohn Garcia, a research professor at the Center for Political Studies at the University of Michigan. By siding with conservatives on immigration, Rubio is losing support among Latinos. If he were to win the Republican nomination and then adopt a more liberal stance on immigration, he runs the danger of alienating the GOP base. Rubios problem is that there is no sweet spot on immigration where he can appeal to both groups.

If there was a middle ground, some politicians would have found it by now, Garcia said. In fact, [immigration has] gotten more polarized over time.

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Immigration Reform And Marco Rubio 2016: Hispanics At Odds With Presidential Candidate

Seattle-based U.S. District Court Judge Thomas Zilly rejected the federal Justice Departments motion Monday to dismiss a lawsuit seeking to secure legal representation for undocumented children who faced deportation. The legal fight was one of several cases related to the governments handling of illegal immigration months after President Obama exercised executive authority to shield millions of undocumented immigrants from deportation.

The American Civil Liberties Union filed the suit to advocate for a group of Salvadoran siblings who illegally entered America to escape gang violence. Federal officials asked Zilly to dismiss the case on jurisdictional grounds and argued it would be too expensive for the government to bankroll legal representation in immigration cases. Zilly ruled the immigrants' request for council constituted an argument for due process and required a legal response.

The Court is of the opinion the due process question plaintiffs have raised in this case is far too important to consign it, as defendants propose, to the perhaps perpetual loop of the administrative and judicial review process, Zilly's ruling said, according to Politico.

The unaccompanied children arrived in the country in 2013 after their father was killed in front of them by gang members outside their home. Federal officials found the children and located an unnamed family member, with whom they now live in Washington.

The ACLU has repeatedly questioned the federal governments use of immigration detention facilities to hold undocumented immigrants until a hearing to determine whether they will face deportation. The civil rights organization expressed disappointment last month when the federal government passed a new Department of Homeland Security funding bill that allocated more than $350 million toward these shelters.

Mandatory detention of people awaiting their immigration proceedings violates the right to due process and is inefficient and costly. Instead of funding immigration detention, Congress should appropriate money for community-based alternatives to detention with case management services, which have been proven to be effective and cost-efficient, the ACLU said in a statement.

Elsewhere, the U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals will hear oral arguments later this month and decide whether to lift Texas federal judge Andrew Hanens injunction which blocked the implementation of Obamas executive orders. Hanen approved the measure on behalf of 26 states, including Texas, who assert Obamas actions were unconstitutional.

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Immigration Reform 2015: Undocumented Children Allowed To Sue For Legal Representation, Judge Rules

A protester in front of Sen. Marco Rubio's Doral, Fla., office in 2013 urges Rubio to stop opposing the inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender families in the Senate's immigration bill. Joe Raedle/Getty Images hide caption

A protester in front of Sen. Marco Rubio's Doral, Fla., office in 2013 urges Rubio to stop opposing the inclusion of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender families in the Senate's immigration bill.

Navigating cultural issues like same-sex marriage and immigration has proved tricky for Republicans.

The country has grown rapidly more accepting of gay and lesbian marriage and relationships. And despite a shrinking base of white support and a fast-growing Latino population, Republicans have struggled to adjust.

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida on Monday hours before announcing his run for president showed how he will try to chart a path through these choppy waters. He drew a fine line on gay rights when asked about his comments on the Indiana law allowing businesses to express their "religious freedom." And despite being one of the shepherds of comprehensive immigration reform in the Senate, he blamed his backing away from the measure on President Obama.

"I don't believe it's right for a florist to say, I'm not going to provide you flowers because you're gay," Rubio said in an interview with NPR's Steve Inskeep.

And yet, he still suggested there are proper grounds for a florist to refuse to serve a gay wedding.

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., announces his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination during an event at the Freedom Tower in Miami. Joe Raedle/Getty Images hide caption

Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., announces his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination during an event at the Freedom Tower in Miami.

"I think there's a difference between not providing services to a person because of their identity, who they are or who they love, and saying, I'm not going to participate in an event, a same-sex wedding, because that violates my religious beliefs. There's a distinction between those two things."

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As Country Changes, Rubio And Republicans Try To Adjust