House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R) on Sunday said that “there’s a lot of distrust of this administration” among House Republicans when it comes to President Obama enforcing laws, which will impact how the GOP approaches immigration reform in the House.
“So one of the first things is we believe it is serious that we, and with some seriousness, that we control our borders, right?” Cantor said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” “There’s not been a determined sense that we are going to secure the borders and make sure that the laws on the books are being implemented now. I would say that is a precursor and has to happen first.”
Cantor said that immigration will not be the main focus of the House Republican conference this legislative session, though.
“I believe that you’re going to see us, in Congress, not only continue this discussion on immigration, but we want to try to get to the heart of the issues that are affecting most Americans,” he said.
When asked by host Major Garrett whether the House GOP will consider legal status or a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, Cantor talked about Republican willingness to provide young undocumented immigrants with legal status.
“We’ve said all along we don’t believe in a comprehensive fix. We want to go in a step-by-step approach to try and address the problems,” he said. “I’ve always said we ought to be dealing with the things that we can agree on, which are the kids.”
