Obama on Immigration: Opportunity for all

By Emily Leyva

President Obama hosted an event at the White House on Monday to commemorate the Cinco de Mayo holiday.

During the celebration, Obama took the opportunity to address current immigration issues which received thunderous applause and loud woots and hollers in approval from the audience.

"Opportunity for all is why I'm trying to fix a broken immigration system," he said.



According to the Department of Homeland Security, in 2012, an estimated 11.4 million unauthorized immigrants were living in the U.S. compared to 11.5 million in January 2011. Though the numbers have decreased, the results suggest little to no change in the immigration reform process. Of those numbers, 59 percent were from Mexico.

In his address, Obama recognized a bipartisan effort that was introduced last year to grow the economy and shrink our deficit. Since then, he said, there has not been any attempt to reintroduce or implement change in immigration reform due to the Republican's party's refusal to cooperate.

"I'm going to work with everyone who is serious about strengthening our borders, modernizing our legal immigration system, keeping our families together and getting this done" said Obama.

The president rallied the audience to encourage their politicians and fellow voters to "get on board" to saying yes to fixing our broken immigration system.

"Today, we celebrate our shared heritage, our shared history, our shared future," said Obama. "And that's not something to be afraid of, that's something we need to embrace."