A day after highlighting the need for immigration reform at an Iowa town hall meeting, President Barack Obama last week raised doubts about whether Congress really had “an appetite immediately to dive into another controversial issue.”
Immigration activists were shocked, to say the least — “pissed” is how Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s Voice, described his reaction — and the remarks undercut the next day’s unveiling of an immigration reform framework, while providing Republicans more leeway to accuse Democrats of demagoguing on the issue.
Clarissa Martinez, the National Council of La Raza’s immigration and national campaign director, put the onus squarely on the president. “To me, what was an opportunity for his leadership to emerge strongly ... well, it’s not quite there yet,” she said.
For veterans of the health care debate who had championed the doomed public option, it was a déjà vu moment. For more than a year, the president flirted with their cause, alternating between endorsing it and diminishing its viability. MoveOn Executive Director Justin Ruben reflected on the campaign and concluded: “The president consistently left wiggle room and never went to the mat.”
“He loves me, he loves me not” — liberal activists feel such an acute sense of seduction and abandonment on a wide swath of issues that Obama has championed. - Politico Story
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