Presidential Candidate Obama Answers Crucial Questions on Immigration

Recently, immigration law professors across the country posed questions to Democratic candidate Barack Obama regarding his views on immigration. His answers show that he is very sympathetic to immigrants and strongly supports positive immigration reform. Excerpts from his answers are below:

Question: As you know, immigration reform provoked a national debate in 2006-07, with a compromise reform bill ultimately self-destructing in the Senate. What would you do as President on the difficult issue of immigration reform? How should the nation address the 12+ million undocumented immigrants who live in the United States today? Is cooperation among the nations of North America (Canada, Mexico, and the United States) necessary to address the immigration and security concerns of the United States?

“We are a nation of laws and a nation of immigrants. We need comprehensive immigration reform that creates a system that is fair, consistent, compassionate, and emphasizes both maintaining the rule of law and the security of our borders while working to keep families together and putting the undocumented on an earned path to citizenship. I will not stop pushing Congress to pass comprehensive reform this year….We also need to bring the 12 million undocumented immigrants out of the shadows. We need to be realistic about the fact that they are here, we can't deport them, and they have become an integral part of our society. We need to give this population a chance to pay a fine, to have provisional status in the country, and to get into the back of the line for citizenship. If President Bush cannot lead on this issue, I will, by reviving our national discussion on comprehensive reform in my first year in the White House and working diligently toward a solution rooted in pragmatism, the rule of law, and our history as a nation of immigrants.”

Question: Several family immigrant categories face severe backlogs, requiring some prospective immigrants to wait years – in some cases decades – to come to the United States. Do you agree that family immigration should remain the foundation of the U.S. immigration system and, if so, what would you do to address the backlogs?

“Family immigration should remain the foundation of our system. We need comprehensive immigration reform that is safe, orderly, humane, and legal, and that places an emphasis on families. This issue was one of the most disturbing aspects of the recent immigration bill. Along with Senator Menendez, I led the fight against the proposal to take visas away from families and put them into a new untested point system. The point system for more skilled immigrants would not have been as offensive had it supplemented our existing visa categories. But instead it took visas from families and gave them to highly educated and skilled workers, thereby effectively

moving us toward a class based immigration system…The point system instead of family visas betrays American family values, the same values that the family-based preferences in our immigration law are designed to enforce…That’s just wrong”

Automatic Citizenship For Children Under Age 18 Once Parents Are Naturalized

Question: When I was 14 years old, my mom became a U.S. Citizen. Someone told her that since I was a Permanent Resident, I would get mine at the same time. But I never received a citizenship card and don’t have any evidence of my citizenship, can you help me?

Answer: Immigration regulations allow minor children under age 18, who are U.S. Permanent Residents to obtain automatic U.S. Citizenship when a parent they are living with is Naturalized (sworn-in). However, the child does not automatically receive a Naturalization Certificate like the parent. The usual method for showing U.S. Citizenship is for the parent to apply for the child’s U.S. Passport. If a person desires to have a Naturalization Certificate anyway, the appropriate form is N-600. The filing fee is currently $460 and it takes about 8 months to receive one.