Marco Rubio Jabs Obama and Insists Conservatives Can Find Common Ground on Immigration

U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., is in the tricky position of trying to lead the fight for immigration reform while still retaining the support of conservatives, which the junior senator from Florida will need if he runs for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.

With reports on Thursday that the House is making progress on reaching an agreement on immigration, Rubio weighed in, insisting that conservatives in both chambers of Congress could find common ground on immigration while adding President Barack Obama cant be trusted on the issue.

Our republic works best when Congress solves problems through open and transparent debates, which is exactly how immigration reform will be addressed this summer, Rubio said on Thursday. Conservatives in both chambers of Congress agree the status quo on immigration is bad for our people, our security and our economy. And we agree we must end todays de facto amnesty, modernize our legal immigration system, deal with our illegal immigrant population by requiring that strict measures be achieved, and that we put in place tough border security and interior enforcement measures so that we never repeat this problem. The American people deserve for their elected representatives to set our nations immigration policy, not leave it at the will of this president to decide which laws hell enforce and which ones hell create on his own by executive order. This is the way our nation is supposed to solve problems.

Also on Thursday, Rubio took to the Mike Gallagher radio show to weigh in on the issue of immigration and why he is fighting for reform.

You have three problems, Rubio said. You have a legal immigration system that doesnt work. You have 11 million people that are here illegally, and theyve been here a decade or longer most of them, the vast majority of them. And then the third problem is that you dont have enforcement mechanisms to keep people from coming in the future illegally. So you have three big problems, and you got to deal with all three of them. If you leave it the way it is, which is whats going to happen if immigration reform fails, all you have is what we have today getting worse. Thats what you have.