In the summer before a tough re-election contest in 2012, President Barack Obama lost support among Latino voters who called him the “deporter in chief.” Then he signed a sweeping executive order to protect hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants from deportation.
Luis V. Gutiérrez, an Illinois Democrat and former congressman, recalled that in his district in the Chicago area, some Latinos celebrated the moment in the streets. “Everywhere I go, this is what people say – ‘Now we’re going to vote for him,'” he said. “I swear to God. It was very important to him in terms of politics.
Twelve years later, President Biden appears to be trying to replicate the move.
Mr. Biden plans to stand with immigrant families on Tuesday as he announces an order that expands legal protections for couples who are undocumented American citizens. He evoked Mr. Obama’s powerful moment by announcing at the anniversary event of the 2012 executive action for young immigrants.
News of Mr. Biden’s expected announcement has drawn praise from Latino and immigrant rights advocates, including from some former critics who just a few weeks ago denounced him as Biden’s “Border Shutdown.”
“This is the Biden administration listening to young people, to voters of color who are demanding a pro-immigrant message on immigration,” said Bruna Bouhid-Sollod, senior political director of immigrant rights group United We Dream Action. “For those of us who are directly affected, it’s about keeping our families safe.”
But beneath the celebration lies uncertainty. It is unclear what this decision will mean for Mr. Biden’s 2024 presidential campaign and whether he will be able to reset the narrative on an issue that has now been dominated by his Republican rival, Donald J. Trump.
Unlike Mr. Obama, Mr. Biden contends with a very different landscape on immigration.
The president is facing pressure from members of his own party, as well as Hispanic voters, many of whom want to see tougher enforcement and a better path to citizenship. Republicans have ratcheted up their rhetoric as they have moved in a key step to blame Mr. Biden for what they described as chaos at the border. Even before Mr. Biden unveiled the executive action, Stephen Miller, the architect of Mr. Trump’s anti-immigration policy, called it “amnesty for illegal aliens during a border invasion.”
Back in 2012, under pressure from the national immigrant rights movement, Mr. Obama entered into executive action when the administration rushed to pre-empt the same legislative proposal from Senator Marco Rubio, then a young star and rising Republican from Florida.
Mr. Rubio is on the far left of his party to authorize work for Dreamers, undocumented immigrants who were brought to the country illegally as children. In a sign of how much the political waters have shifted, Mr. Rubio has now fallen in line behind Mr. Trump as he seeks to be his choice to run mate.
Mr. Biden has been criticized by Latino leaders, immigrant rights activists and progressives for playing too hard on the demands of the right. Democratic leaders and strategists say it’s too early to say whether the latest action will boost Democrats’ spirits, especially after the president’s recent decision to block asylum for migrants as they cross the border escalated.
Chris Newman, a longtime immigrant rights leader, said Mr. Biden’s order could still be a moment. The president, he said, must send a strong enough message to galvanize public opinion in favor of the policy, which can help people on the campaign trail and in its defense, because it is likely to be challenged in court.
“Performance is as important as politics and policy,” said Mr. Newman, legal director and general counsel for the National Day Laborer Organizing Network, a labor organization based in Los Angeles. It will also depend, he said, on whether Mr. Biden can offer other forms of relief to other groups of undocumented immigrants.
Mr. Obama’s executive action created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program. It provides work and study permits to undocumented immigrants brought to the country illegally as children, provided they pass a criminal background check and meet certain requirements. The immediate impact was felt across the country. But the initiative – which at the top covers about 800,000 immigrants – is still in court, and new applicants can no longer enter.
Mr. Biden’s order on the couple will benefit about 500,000 people.
Mr. Biden’s supporters and allies say the president has pursued immigration issues for much of his career. In 2020, Mr. Biden, who is serving as Obama’s vice president, will have to walk a fine line between invoking Mr. Obama’s legacy on health care and the economy, while avoiding the spike in deportations under the Obama administration.
Mr. Biden helped negotiate the Dream Act, which sought a path to citizenship for people brought to the country illegally as children, when it approached Congress in 2010. Three years later, he worked with Republican Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham. . pushed comprehensive immigration reform legislation through the Senate, though the effort was ultimately stymied by far-right Republicans calling it “amnesty.”
“He’s been in the middle of all of this since then,” said Héctor Sánchez Barba, president of the Latino rights group Mi Familia Vota, adding that the president was at Mr. Obama’s side when he talked about DACA.
In recent months, Mr. Biden has been pushing the Republican narrative, with campaign ads, visits to the U.S.-Mexico border and pushing for bipartisan legislation, which Republicans have twice blocked. Promoting one of the Senate’s proposals during a dinner with South Carolina Democrats in January, Mr. Biden suggested he was serious about enforcement, saying, “If the bill becomes law today, I’m going to close the border right now and fix it quickly.”
Immigration and the southern border will be a major concern for Republican and independent voters in the 2024 presidential campaign. But some pollsters and Democratic strategists have warned that it may be too late to sway voters who say Mr. Biden.
But in one sense, Mr. Biden’s latest move to protect undocumented couples could be a game changer. The American Business Immigration Coalition, which represents hundreds of companies and supports Mr. Biden’s order, has predicted that the latest policy could help Mr. Biden in the swing states on the battlefield. In Nevada, Arizona and Georgia, it is estimated that more than 300,000 voters live in “mixed status” households, or homes where at least one person is undocumented.
Mr. Gutiérrez, a former Illinois congressman, polls did not reveal what he called the “X factor” of this new action – how quickly word of mouth could spread among Mexican American and Central American families of mixed status who would benefit.
“It will bring joy, happiness, and the best thing it will do is bring hope,” he said.
