President Barack Obama is considering using executive action to let millions of undocumented immigrants obtain work permits that would allow them stay in the U.S. legally, said a Democratic Senate aide.
White House officials have told allies in Congress to expect an announcement of a large-scale action most likely in September, just before the midterm congressional elections, the aide said, asking for anonymity to discuss an unannounced plan.
Large-scale action by Obama on immigration could improve Democrats chances of retaining control of the Senate in the November elections by energizing Hispanic voters, said Gary Segura, a political science professor at Stanford University in California and co-founder of the polling firm Latino Decisions.
The bigger impact would be on the 2016 presidential election by strengthening long-term Hispanic support for the party, he said.
A surge in turnout by Hispanics, who typically vote in low numbers in midterm elections, could be decisive for Democrats in the competitive Senate race in Colorado, and possibly in Georgia and North Carolina, he said.
Hispanics account for 15 percent of eligible voters in Colorado and 5 percent in both Georgia and North Carolina, according to an analysis of U.S. Census data by the Center for American Progress.
Democrats would stand to make greater political gains from action by Obama on the immigration matter in the 2016 presidential election, when Hispanics typically vote in higher numbers. Obama’s order in 2012 to stop deportations of immigrants who came to the country illegally as children was “wildly popular” with Latino voters that year, Segura said.
In the 2012 race, 71 percent of Hispanics voted for Obama. Eight years earlier, then-Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry got 53 percent of the Latino vote as he lost to then-President George W. Bush, who supported revisions to immigration policy.
Deepening Democratic support in the expanding Hispanic population in key presidential battleground states “starts to create a demographic wall in the Electoral College” that determines the winner in presidential races, Segura said.
