President Obama told the Congressional Hispanic Caucus that there are very few obstacles they haven’t encountered since he took office.
“You had fiscal showdowns and government shutdowns and pandemics and oil spills and pirates. Y’all remember the pirates?” Obama asked the audience gathered at the Washington Convention Center Thursday night for the Congressional Hispanic Caucus Institute’s annual black-tie dinner.
“I mean, the only thing we haven’t had to deal with is like the asteroid, you know? Or aliens,” he joked. “That’s true, good point, shouldn’t have mentioned the aliens,” he laughingly responded to someone in the audience.
It wasn’t clear if the interrupter made a joke about GOP nominee Donald Trump’s derisive remarks about illegal Latino immigrants, or to the urban legends that the government has conspired to hide proof of extraterrestrial life.
Congress needs to make “effective immigration reform a reality in this country,” Obama said. “I’m proud of the executive actions I’ve taken to modernize our system.”
He told the audience to band together to fight the anti-immigrant talk “that is a little uglier, a little meaner” this year than usual, he said.
Some people “are betting that if they can drive us far enough apart … that it will pay off at the polls,” he said. “But I’m telling you that is a bet that they are going to lose.”
