State of the Union 2023: Progressive response pushes immigration liberalization
Haisten Willis
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Rep. Delia Ramirez (D-IL) focused on immigration reform as she delivered the progressive response to the State of the Union address late Tuesday night.
Ramirez, a first-term Democrat, gave a speech intended to be a response not only to President Joe Biden‘s State of the Union address but to the Republican rebuttal to by Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders.
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“My parents came to this country from Guatemala,” she said early on. “My mother crossed the border while she was pregnant with me. She did that to give her children a fighting chance to escape the poverty she grew up in.”
Ramirez later said her husband also immigrated from Guatemala, in his case as a 14-year-old “dreamer,” and called on a path to citizenship for the 12 million illegal immigrants currently living in the country.
“This is personal for me,” she said. “I know what it’s like to live with that uncertainty and fear. It’s time to finally pass comprehensive immigration reform.”
Her speech was delivered on behalf of the Working Families Party, though Ramirez is a Democrat and she stressed mostly mainstream Democratic priorities.
Another theme was underscoring how Democrats can win working-class voters, a constituency the party has slipped with in recent years.
“Washington needs more working-class people making decisions,” Ramirez said. “Now that I’m in Congress, I am here for working families struggling to make a decent life across this country.”
The rebuttal touched on a wide range of issues, including minimum wage laws, labor unions, student loans, the opioid crisis, gun control, housing costs, COVID-19, mental health, abortion, infrastructure, corporate profits, paid sick leave, the child tax credit, and health care.
Ramirez also lashed out at Republicans, including Sanders, who she accused of wanting to “politicize” the “humanitarian crisis” at the southern border.
“Biden inherited a broken immigration system, and Republicans in Congress would rather scare voters than work towards a solution,” she said. “We need to end Title 42. We believe the president and the country can do better.”
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Republicans have only tried to destroy the economic security of working families since taking over the House, Ramirez said, and she predicted that a wide coalition of working-class voters can get the lower chamber back in the hands of Democrats during the next election.
“I want to tell you, whatever part of the working class you’re from, we have plenty in common,” she said. “Together we have the majority.”