The campaign manager for President Joe Biden looked to dodge questions surrounding the new executive order the president signed that gives illegal immigrants a clearer pathway to become citizens.
On the “America Decides” TV program on CBS News Wednesday, Julie Chavez Rodriguez was asked by host Fin Gomez why Biden implemented this policy “four-and-a-half months out from the November 5 election,” rather than much earlier than in his administration.
The campaign manager acknowledged that reforming immigration was a major priority for the president since the first day of his administration. She then bashed presumptive Republican candidate Donald Trump for encouraging fellow members of the GOP to vote against a bipartisan immigration bill that was introduced earlier in 2024.
The host then asked whether Rodriguez thought this new policy might encourage “mixed-status families” who benefit from the policy to vote for Bieden come November.
Rodriguez responded by saying any family eligible under the executive order “will be able to sleep better tonight knowing that they have an opportunity to help ensure that they are not separated by cruel policies.”
She then added:
“They will be able to hug each other a little bit tighter knowing that they can remain together as a whole family in this country as a result of this executive order. Those are the things that matter most.”
A lot of Latino voters have been turning away from Biden, as Gomez pointed out. The host then asked the campaign manager to respond to some critics who have pointed out that this executive order is only a “political move to maintain support among Latino voters,” who will be crucial to his potential success come November.
Rodriguez didn’t respond to the question directly, instead trying to point to Biden’s immigration track record since he entered the White House. According to the campaign manager, those accomplishments include explaining the Affordable Care Act to include recipients of the DACA program, or the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals.
Earlier this week, Biden announced a new executive order that will allow the spouses of U.S citizens the ability to apply for permanent residency, which can lead to citizenship. These people who don’t have a legal status would normally have to leave the U.S. for as many as 10 years before being able to seek that path to citizenship.
Senior officials within the Biden administration said that roughly 500,000 immigrants could benefit from this new policy.
To qualify for this new benefit, an individual must be married to a U.S. citizen and have lived in America for 10 years.
The DACA program, enacted during the Obama administration, has shielded hundreds of thousands of people from deportation. These individuals came to the U.S. when they were young children.
The program required applicants to be in America on June 15 of 2012, and continuously for the five years before that.
FWD.us, an advocacy group, recently said that more than 1 million illegal immigrants are living in the U.S. and are married to U.S. citizens. This means that there are still hundreds of thousands of people who won’t qualify under Biden’s new plan because they haven’t been in the U.S. for at least 10 years.