On Univision, Eddie "Piolin" Sotelo interviewed the president about immigration reform (the White House website has a photo but no transcript). From the LA Times:
EPS: But how can you ask for their vote now… if, like… most of my listeners, that's what they see … that you haven't worked that hard to make comprehensive immigration reform now.
POTUS: Piolín, I completely disagree with you on this. With all due respect, even though I'm in your studio. The notion that we haven't worked it hard is just not true. There is a notion that somehow if I had worked it hard enough, we could have magically done it. That's just not the way our system works. If I need 60 votes to get this done, then I'm gonna have to have some support from the other side. If the Latino community decides to sit out this election, then there will be fewer votes and it will be less likely to get done. And the other side, which is fighting against this, is not gonna support it, so look, let me say this as an African American. We worked for decades on civil rights. Civil rights didn't come after one year. It didn't come after two years. People had to march, they had to have their heads beaten, they had fire hoses put on them. Even after Dr. King gave his I Have a Dream Speech, it still took years before African Americans achieved full citizenship in this country. Change isn't easy. It doesn't happen overnight. Now, you know, for us to say, oh, it didn't happen right away and so we're just giving up and we're not gonna be involved in the system, that makes no sense. That's not the history of this country. That's not the history of change in our own lives. All of us, you included Piolín, have gone through hardships, you've had your struggles and what happens is, is that you keep on working and you keep on working and you keep on working and finally, eventually you make a breakthrough and you get things done. That's how change happens for us personally, that's how change happens in the country, so instead of us giving up, we just have to keep working until it gets done.
