{"id":1527,"date":"2009-05-03T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2009-05-03T06:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/166.62.41.2\/~holaamericanews\/2009\/05\/03\/obama-promises-to-tackle-immigration-in-2009\/"},"modified":"2009-05-03T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2009-05-03T06:00:00","slug":"obama-promises-to-tackle-immigration-in-2009","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/obama-promises-to-tackle-immigration-in-2009\/","title":{"rendered":"Obama promises to tackle immigration in 2009"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><!--IMAGE images\/stories\/2009\/04-29-2009_issue\/features\/obama.jpgIMAGE-->President Barack Obama and his Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel have pledged their support for immigration issues to be addressed within the year, according to reports from the Associated Press and the White House. Though many \u2013 including Vice President Joe Biden \u2013 have expressed skepticism that widespread immigration reform would be possible in the current economic climate, Obama seems cautiously optimistic. Senior administration officials were quoted as saying that this could be on the table as early as May, however, immigration would still not be on the same level as higher priority issues such as healthcare and energy. \u201cNobody\u2019s promising legislation or a vote this year,\u201d one official added.      <!--more-->  <img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\" alignleft size-full wp-image-1526\" style=\"float: left;\" alt=\"obama2\" src=\"http:\/\/166.62.41.2\/~holaamericanews\/wp-content\/uploads\/2009\/05\/obama2.jpg\" width=\"250\" height=\"179\" \/>President Barack Obama and his Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel have pledged their support for immigration issues to be addressed within the year, according to reports from the Associated Press and the White House. Though many \u2013 including Vice President Joe Biden \u2013 have expressed skepticism that widespread immigration reform would be possible in the current economic climate, Obama seems cautiously optimistic. Senior administration officials were quoted as saying that this could be on the table as early as May, however, immigration would still not be on the same level as higher priority issues such as healthcare and energy. \u201cNobody\u2019s promising legislation or a vote this year,\u201d one official added.<\/p>\n<p> \u201cPeople who have been here for a long time and put down roots here have to have some mechanisms over time to get out of the shadows,\u201d Obama told a California town hall audience late last month, echoing some of the rhetoric he used in his presidential campaign. The goal will be to have an immigration program which \u201ccontrols immigration and makes it an orderly system,\u201d said Cecilia Munoz, director of White House intergovernmental affairs. The strategy would likely be similar to the one outlined in the campaign \u2013 expect undocumented immigrants to pay taxes and fines, yet keep them in the US with a path to legalization. <\/p><div id=\"holaa-2227757855\" class=\"holaa-ad-inside-articles-2\" style=\"margin-top: 2px;margin-bottom: 2px;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;text-align: center;\"><div class=\"holaa-adlabel\">Advertisements<\/div><a data-no-instant=\"1\" href=\"https:\/\/www.desmoinesperformingarts.org\/whats-on\/series\/summerarts\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"a2t-link\" aria-label=\"HI-SummerSeries-300&#215;250-SP\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/HI-SummerSeries-300x250-SP.jpg\" alt=\"\"  width=\"300\" height=\"250\"  style=\"display: inline-block;\" \/><\/a><\/div><br style=\"clear: both; display: block; float: none;\"\/>\n<p> Emanuel, who was quoted last year as saying he thought immigration reform would be put off until the President\u2019s second term, is backing Obama whole-heartedly. Janet Murguia, president of La Raza, recalled arguing with Emanuel in the Clinton administration about immigration issues, where Emanuel advocated tougher regulations and tough enforcement. But Emanuel has since modified his stance. Murguia thinks that Emanuel\u2019s previous stance was simply good politics for the occasion. \u201cThere\u2019s no more brilliant political strategist than Rahm,\u201d Murguia said. \u201cHe was shrewdly trying to lay out vehicles that would provide Democrats cover on [the immigration] issue.\u201d Now that Latino voters are a sizeable part of a Democratic constituency, Rahm Emanuel is free to voice his support, argues Murguia. <\/p>\n<p> Whatever the reasons, attitudes are beginning to change sharply in Washington. And grassroots support has been well under development since Rep. Gutierrez began his now much-publicized campaign in support of proactive, positive legislation for immigrants. At the suggestion that this might not be the best time for an immigration bill, Gutierrez was incredulous. \u201cThere is never a wrong time for us,\u201d he said. \u201cFamilies are being divided and destroyed, and they need help now.\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"holaa-1471896049\" class=\"holaa-after-content\" style=\"margin-top: 2px;margin-bottom: 2px;margin-left: auto;margin-right: auto;text-align: center;\"><div class=\"holaa-adlabel\">Advertisements<\/div><a data-no-instant=\"1\" href=\"https:\/\/progressiowa.org\/2023\/08\/take-action-with-progress-iowa\/?utm_source=news&#038;utm_medium=site&#038;utm_campaign=2026&#038;utm_id=News\" rel=\"noopener\" class=\"a2t-link\" target=\"_blank\" aria-label=\"Progress Iowa Spanish 300&#215;250\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Progress-Iowa-Spanish-300x250-1.png\" alt=\"\"  width=\"300\" height=\"250\"  style=\"display: inline-block;\" \/><\/a><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President Barack Obama and his Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel have pledged their support for immigration issues to be addressed within the year, according to reports from the Associated Press [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1526,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"translation":{"provider":"WPGlobus","version":"3.0.2","language":"es","enabled_languages":["en","es"],"languages":{"en":{"title":true,"content":true,"excerpt":false},"es":{"title":false,"content":false,"excerpt":false}}},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1527"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1527"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1527\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1526"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1527"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1527"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/holaamericanews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1527"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}