ATLANTA -- President Donald Trump has an unlikely defender of his approach to immigration law: former President Jimmy Carter.
Speaking to Georgia college students, the 39th president expressed optimism Wednesday that Trump might break a legislative logjam with his six-month deadline for Congress to address the status of 800,000-plus illegal immigrants who were brought to the country as children.
As the 92-year-old Democrat spoke at Emory University in Atlanta, Democratic congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi of California and Charles Schumer of New York were huddled with the Republican Trump at the White House. Afterward, Pelosi and Schumer announced a deal they said would protect young immigrants from deportation and grant some Republican demands on border security.
Trump offered his own take Thursday morning via Twitter. He expressed sympathy for the young immigrants affected by the debate over the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, created by an executive order of President Barack Obama.
But Trump also wrote that, "No deal was made last night on DACA. Massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent. Would be subject to vote," he wrote, referring to the deferred-action program by its initials.
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And he maintained that a U.S.-Mexico border wall "will continue to be built," though Pelosi and Schumer said that's not part of any agreement.
Carter, not privy to the negotiations in Washington, told Emory students Wednesday evening that the "pressures and the publicity that Trump has brought to the immigration issue" could eventually yield comprehensive immigration law changes that George W. Bush and Obama could not muster in their presidencies.
"I don't see that as a hopeless cause," Carter said, and he added that Trump's critics, including himself, "have to give him credit when he does some things that are not as bad" as they are depicted.
Carter made his remarks after correcting a student's question, submitted through Facebook, about Trump's "decision to end DACA."
"As a matter of fact, to give Trump some due, he hasn't ended [the program] yet," Carter said. "What he said is he's given the Congress six months to address the issue, which is long overdue."
Carter also noted that Trump has waffled on whether he'd actually move to deport the program participants if Congress doesn't act.
Among Trump's Thursday morning tweets: "Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really!"
Carter reminded students that Obama, whom Carter supported, failed to win passage for the DREAM Act -- named for the sometimes sympathetic stories of the young immigrants -- even when Obama had Democratic majorities on Capitol Hill.
Beyond immigration, Carter told students that he supports a single-payer health care system, and he recalled proposing a measure as president that would have phased in a "Medicare-for-all" structure by extending benefits first to children, then to older Americans as the federal budget allowed. That did not pass.
A Section on 09/15/2017