Luis Gutierrez Quotes

I disagree with the concept that somehow or another we're going to pack up 10, to 12, to 15 million people and ship them back to the country of origin. That's not going to happen.

We have to be realistic: we are not going to be able to deport 11 million people - most are hard-working people.

Governor Romney is a real hardliner on illegal immigration.

I will continue to enforce all the laws, including illegal immigration. Nothing changes.

Are we going to go out and arrest and detain and deport 11 million people? Nobody would argue that that is what we are going to do, because we have never demonstrated the political will to do that, nor have we ever committed the requisite resources to do that.

I'm sure the president doesn't enjoy being called deporter-in-chief.

One way to sensitize Washington to the illegal alien problem is to make them pay for it.

As a nation that values immigration, and depends on immigration, we should have immigration laws that work and make us proud. Yet today we do not. Instead, we see many employers turning to the illegal labor market. We see millions of hard-working men and women condemned to fear and insecurity in a massive, undocumented economy.

Our current immigration laws are in a word --- unjust!

The system is broken …. We must secure our borders. But we have to have a way of matching willing workers with willing employers and have a way for people to do the jobs that Americans don’t seem to want to do…. But I don’t believe that we are going to take people who have been here for 40 or 50 years and ship them back where they came from…. As long as there is a demand for workers, workers will come.

You can’t fix legal immigration until you fix illegal immigration.

We simply cannot allow people to pour into the United States undetected, undocumented, unchecked, and circumventing the line of people who are waiting patiently, diligently, and lawfully to become immigrants in this country.

I completely disagree with the idea of eliminating ICE. We should not eliminate ICE: it's like saying we should eliminate the police force.

We have farmers in southwestern Yuma, so immigration - they wanted to talk to us about it.

The media tends to cover immigration issues through the frame of how it impacts everybody but actual citizens of the United States.

The truth is, most undocumented immigrants come here for economic opportunity and the American Dream. They aren't seeking tax credits or handouts.

We are a nation of immigrants, but we are also a nation of laws.

Well, my constituents are happy that the Republican Party has finally gotten off its duff, seeing that we do control the House and the Senate and the presidency, and taken up the issue of illegal immigration.

Only Congress has the authority to adequately and holistically address our broken immigration system.

Let's be honest - tracking down, rounding up, and deporting millions of people isn't realistic. Anyone who suggests otherwise isn't being straight with you. It's also not who we are as Americans.

Arizona has become a national leader in the restoration of the Rule of Law, with over 100,000 illegal aliens having left the state since 2007.

I'm not anti-immigration.

Our immigration system is not broken. We don't need, and Congress shouldn't enact, amnesty.

However, in recent years our nation has seen a sizable influx of illegal immigration that at best highlights some alarming inadequacies and at worst indicates a broken system.

The fact of the matter is, this country is not going to deport 11 million undocumented immigrants. What are we supposed to do with them? What are we supposed to do with these kids?