President Barack Obama has been criticized by Hispanic groups that want him to halt deportations of illegal immigrants, but Latino columnist Ruben Navarrette Jr. says part of the problem for the president is that he's trying to protect union jobs.
"They finally have figured out, many Latinos, what I and others have known for years now, which is he doesn't care about them," Navarrette told Ed Berliner on "MidPoint" on
Newsmax TV on Monday. "He doesn't want to do immigration reform."
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"In fact, if you really want to be honest, he belongs to a restrictionist wing of the Democratic Party that sees immigrants as a threat to blue-collar, union workers," he explained.
"There are some folks who believe that unions have made this miraculous turnaround because they want to bring in these immigrants as new members," he said.
"The rank-and-file blue-collar members — the tradesmen, the electricians and plumbers and others do not want . . . amnesty," Navarrette contends.
"The game that's being played by the very well-paid and cared-for union leaders in this country is to tell their members one thing, 'we're not going to get an amnesty,' while they try to confuse Latinos and advocates and tell them something altogether different," he explained.
According to the nationally syndicated columnist, there's "an incredible amount of dishonesty in this debate."
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