“Meet the Candidates”: Romney v.s Gingrich on Immigration

America's Voice Blog

Posted 01/26/12 at 12:19pm

Given that Florida is over 22.5% Hispanic, it is not surprising that in anticipation of the Florida primary next week the GOP primary frontrunners, Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney, took time to participate in a forum yesterday put together by the largest Spanish television network Univision and the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The candidates sat down with one of the most influential Spanish language political journalists, Univision’s Jorge Ramos for in depth interviews re: immigration and more. (We live-tweeted both interviews here.)

The first candidate up, Newt Gingrich, received according to the NYT Caucus Blog, “one of the toughest” grilling of his campaign. The former Speaker came out swinging: when Ramos asked him about Mitt Romney's "self-deportation" plan, articulated at Monday night's debate in Tampa, Gingrich burst out laughing.

"How close are you to breaking up laughing out loud?" he asked Ramos. "I think you have to live in a world of Swiss bank accounts and Cayman Island accounts and automatic - you know, $20 million a year of no work - to have a fantasy this far from reality. For Romney to believe that somebody's grandmother is going to be so cut off that she is going to self deport. He certainly shows no concern for the humanity of people who are already here."

They also discussed Gingrich’s guest-worker permits plan and his support of the portion of the DREAM Act that gives undocumented youth who sign up for the military a path toward legalization. Gingrich has already explained he doesn’t support giving a path to citizenship to youth that attend college and believes they should pay out-of-state tuition rates. He said:

"They can go to college… I wasn't suggesting we run around and try to deport them. I have suggested that if they want to become citizens, they can join the military."

Watch Newt Gingrich’s interview here:

In his own interview with Ramos later in the day, Mitt Romney continued to stake out a more extreme stance on immigration, appearing less inclined to listen to Latino perspectives than Gingrich had been, and insisting that his messaging on the economy was the best way to win Latino voters.

He defended self-deportation (ie: attrition through enforcement, akin to mass deportation), saying that stronger enforcement (including greater use of the E-Verify system) was the best way to get undocumented immigrants to give up and go home. He said that Gingrich had supported self-deportation in a past interview with Laura Ingraham and accused the former Speaker of pandering to Latinos by telling them anything different.

He made sure to emphasize that he was "not anti-immigrant."

"I'm pro-immigrant," he said. "I like immigrants."

Romney, like Gingrich, defended his opposition of the DREAM Act and insisted that undocumented students pay out-of-state tuition. Ramos then called attention to DREAMer and audience member Lucy Allain, who famously confronted Romney over the DREAM Act last week, asking Romney why he would deny her an education. Romney responded that she could go to college, just not at in-state rates, and advised her to "shop around...there are a lot of colleges out there, and many of them are inexpensive. Miami-Dade, here, can't be too expensive." (Actually, a 4-year degree at Miami Dade for out-of-state students costs a hefty $48,000.)

Watch the interview here: