Obama's Immigration Speech: Big Words and Passion, but What's New?

President Barack Obama's impassioned appeal for comprehensive immigration reform on Thursday recast familiar themes and objectives, slammed Republican opponents, and sought to bring the nation together on one of its most intractable political issues.

Reaching out in every direction -- to immigrant history, to the Statue of Liberty and Emma Lazarus' stirring poetry -- Obama showed at times the fervor of his 2008 campaign speeches, calling immigration reform "a moral imperative," and demanding accountability and a common sense solution.

But beneath the powerful rhetoric and genuine commitment, there was little new.

The problems are, of course, the same -- namely, the porous and increasingly dangerous Mexico-U.S. border and the fate of the 11 million illegal immigrants living in the United States, most of them poor and uneducated Hispanics from Mexico, Central America and South America.

The proposed solutions are the same: reinforce the border; send more troops to stop human and drug smugglers; hold U.S. businesses accountable for hiring illegal immigrants; hold illegal immigrants accountable but give them a way to become citizens -- they have to admit they broke the law; they have to register, pay taxes and fines and learn English.

There's little agreement, if any, on a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants -- conservatives call it amnesty -- and there's certainly no agreement on the new Arizona anti-illegal immigration law that reignited the debate and inspired Obama to take it to the nation on Thursday with his first major speech on immigration since becoming president.

"In recent days,'' Obama said, "the issue of immigration has become once more a source of fresh contention in our country, with the passage of a controversial law in Arizona and the heated reactions we've seen across America. Some have rallied behind this new policy. Others have protested and launched boycotts of the state. And everywhere, people have expressed frustration with a system that seems fundamentally broken."

Nationwide surveys and polls taken since April, when Arizona passed the anti-immigration law, show that a majority of Americans support the measure, which requires police officers enforcing another law -- speeding, for example -- to question a person's immigration status if there's a reasonable suspicion that the person is in the country illegally.

There's not a whole lot of friendliness out there in Middle America, the Southwest and West toward illegal immigrants and their supporters. A sizable number of Americans oppose reform, see it as dangerous to the economy and their well-being, and would be just as happy to send illegal immigrants home and board up the border. In fact, a couple of dozen states are considering similar laws and defying the U.S. Justice Department, which is threatening to file a lawsuit against Arizona.

It isn't that Obama doesn't recognize the reasons why a border state like Arizona, the main portal for illegal immigrants and drug smugglers, would enact a law with the intent of stopping or deporting illegal immigrants. "States like Arizona have decided to take matters into their own hands,'' he said. "Given the levels of frustration across the country, that is understandable. But it is also ill conceived ... divisive."

The anti-immigrant views throw fuel on the fire and have turned the national debate into an angry and even violent squabble.

There's agreement in Washington on only one thing: Immigration reform doesn't have a prayer this year. With midterm elections around the corner and the Republican Party and Tea Party movement likely to make further inroads, immigration reform is a hot-button issue no one really wants to touch.

So why did Obama make this speech now?

Democrats need the Hispanic vote in November. Feeling forgotten and taken for granted, Hispanics have been threatening to stay home from the polls. Any drop in Hispanic voters in the Southwest and West can break Democratic Party candidates like Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, who is mired in a tough campaign for re-election. He needs every Latino vote in his state, so he recently promised to push immigration reform and most likely nudged Obama to take up the torch.

Evidence that Obama's speech achieved some of its objective came immediately. Rep. Luis Gutierrez, an Illinois Democrat who has criticized the president's lack of action on immigration, said Thursday on MSNBC that he was "happy" and that the president "had laid the foundation" for a reinvigorated fight for reform. Angie Kelly, an official at the Center for American Progress, an advocacy organization founded by John Podesta, a former Obama campaign official and former Clinton White House aide, was exhilarated after listening to Obama's speech. "He gave a clear signal that he would not give up and was not giving in,'' she said in a phone interview. "His passion was unquestionable."

It was indeed a rousing coda, vintage Barack Obama.

"The question now is whether we will have the courage and the political will to pass a bill through Congress, to finally get it done," he said. "But the fact is, without bipartisan support ... we cannot solve this problem. Reform that brings accountability to our immigration system cannot pass without Republican votes. That is the political and mathematical reality."

True enough, but now he has to win over the majority of the American people.