Obama's Green Card Policy; Murder Mystery
BURNETT: OUTFRONT tonight, the battle over illegal immigration and the president's polarizing new policy that some say amounts to amnesty. All right so you've probably heard the number that there could be up to 12 million undocumented people in America right now. But for those who are married to or have kids that are U.S. citizens, the White House now has an offer. Come out of the shadows and identify yourself and ask for a green card. Now to get it, you're going to have to leave the country but now instead of waiting years, maybe even a decade to find out if you can come back, you're going to get an answer more quickly and the chances of getting a yes to return permanently with a green card, greater. Now that's the plan. Some people are furious about it. Is it amnesty? Let's bring in Kris Kobach. He helped write Arizona's strict new immigration law, which in and of itself as he is well aware is a very polarizing topic. He thinks this is a terrible idea. On the other side is David Leopold from the American Immigration Lawyers Association. Good to have both of you with us. Kris, is this amnesty?</s>KRIS KOBACH, LAW PROFESSOR, UNIV. OF MISSOURI: It's part of an amnesty. It's part two of an administrative amnesty. As we know, the administration a few months ago announced that it was going to basically drop about 300,000 cases that were already in the deportation pipeline. That's one part of an administrative action. This one basically allows thousands of people who would otherwise have to go out of the country and wait while they see if they can overcome this three-year bar or 10-year bar that Congress put into place in 1996, now they can just do it here in the United States. So really if the administration is going to do a back door amnesty, they need to take several steps and this is the second of the steps they need to take. So yes, it's part of an amnesty.</s>BURNETT: David, why isn't it?</s>DAVID LEOPOLD, AMERICAN IMMIGRATION LAWYERS ASSOCIATION: It's not amnesty. What this is, is a -- it's a minor processing change. And what we're doing here, what the administration is doing is keeping U.S. citizens together with their foreign spouses. And what we have to remember is that in order to get this waiver, which is done in the United States, they still have to show that the U.S. citizen would suffer a hardship. So nobody is getting anything, Erin. This is a process change. This is going to allow people to stay together. This is going to promote family unity. It's going to keep America safer and it's going to be wise use of our tax dollars. What Mr. Kobach -- what Kris is talking about when he says -- he uses that word "amnesty," remember, amnesty is a word that people who hate immigration like to throw around instead of solutions. And what this is, this is a solution. This is a solution that allows people to wait in the United States with their family rather than have to go sit in a city like Ciudad Juarez where people get killed, it's one of the most dangerous cities in the world, and this allows families to stay together. What's wrong with an American husband being with his wife? What's wrong with an American wife being with her husband -- nothing. I can't imagine any American would oppose family unity, so I'm very surprised that there's even any opposition to this.</s>BURNETT: I thought, David, that once -- if you were married to someone and you could prove that it was legitimate and you hadn't done so in order to get access to the United States, that you could get that card anyway?</s>LEOPOLD: I wish that were the case, Erin, but the law is so broken that even if you are married to a United States citizen, you still have to go through various different hoops to stay here. And what happens is folks that are in the country who are undocumented and they're married to United States citizens, they can't simply go and apply for a green card and what happens is the way the law is set up and the reason we call it a broken law is because the way this law is set up is they have to leave the United States. Once they step outside the United States, now they're barred from coming back and all that's going on --</s>KOBACH: And there's a reason for that.</s>BURNETT: But Kris --</s>LEOPOLD: Hang on Kris --</s>BURNETT: Let me ask you that. OK, hold on a second, David, because I want to get Kris in here. Kris, but is part -- does that deter people who shouldn't be coming in from coming in, the fact or not.</s>KOBACH: Yes.</s>BURNETT: Yes?</s>KOBACH: Yes, there's a reason Congress set this up. Congress in 1996 wanted to impose a penalty on illegal aliens, whether they decide to marry a U.S. citizen or not. And that was if you stay in the United States for six months, then if you are caught or if you acknowledge that, you have got to wait three years before you can even get in line in your home country to apply for a lawful visa. If you stay here a year illegally, you are barred for 10 years. Congress wanted to put people who have broken our laws in a worse position procedurally than those people who are in Mexico and are doing it the right way or in Sweden doing it the right way --</s>LEOPOLD: Actually that's not true --</s>KOBACH: -- and haven't broken our laws.</s>LEOPOLD: Kris --</s>BURNETT: David, that sounds rational put that way --</s>KOBACH: That's exactly what Congress did in 1996.</s>LEOPOLD: That's just not a fair statement of the law --</s>KOBACH: Congress did that in 1996. That is exactly what the law says --</s>LEOPOLD: That's not a correct statement of the law.</s>LEOPOLD: No it's not --</s>LEOPOLD: And I'm happy to show you the statute -- I'm happy to show you the --</s>KOBACH: I actually just looked at it before we --</s>KOBACH: I'm quite familiar with it.</s>LEOPOLD: Let me finish. What the Congress said, Kris, and I think you know this, is that if you marry an American citizen, generally speaking, you're forgiven. The problem is if you have --</s>KOBACH: You're talking about marriage. We're talking about the 10-year --</s>LEOPOLD: Kris, let me finish. If you enter the country without an inspection originally, even if you're a child, you can't get that green card even if you have a large family, even if you're married to a U.S. citizen.</s>BURNETT: OK.</s>LEOPOLD: You have to get a waiver --</s>BURNETT: Final word to Kris.</s>LEOPOLD: And so all the --</s>KOBACH: I think the bottom line here is -- I think we probably both agree that what the administration is doing is trying to get around the fact that Congress has not passed an amnesty and this administration wants one. And I think there's a larger issue here that people on the left and the right can hopefully agree on. If we're going to have an amnesty, let Congress do it. Let the people's representatives debate it. Let's not have the administration do it in a back doorway that isn't putting it on the table in front of the people.</s>BURNETT: All right, gentlemen, thanks very much to both of you --</s>LEOPOLD: This is common sense enforcement.</s>BURNETT: Thanks to both of you.</s>KOBACH: Thank you.</s>LEOPOLD: Thank you.</s>BURNETT: Please let us know on our Facebook page what you think about this one and whether you think there's political motivations as well coming into an election with the Hispanic vote. Well tonight we have new clues in the royal murder mystery we have been following this week on OUTFRONT. Investigators say they're very close to identifying the body of a young woman whose age is somewhere between 15 and 24. The victim, whose body gave no visible clues about how she died, was found a couple of miles outside the Queen of England's Sandringham estate. Now the discovery came just two days after the royal family was vacationing there. In fact the queen is still there. Investigators believe the victim could have been dead for up to four months but have no idea whether she was murdered on the grounds or if her body was just dumped there. Some of the victim's personal belongings have been found on the premises. That has not helped police solve the mystery. OUTFRONT spoke to royal family journalist Victoria Arbiter. Here's what she had to say.</s>VICTORIA ARBITER, ROYAL JOURNALIST: When the body was discovered it obviously was in more of a decomposed state than we were initially led to believe and so that's making identifying it really very difficult. For example, police have said they don't believe she was stabbed but there's not enough flesh left on the body to really establish whether or not she was stabbed.</s>BURNETT: Victoria said the teeth and bones from the victim's body have been tested and police will have results in the next three days. Well still OUTFRONT, with just four days to go until New Hampshire, Mitt Romney has what everybody would acknowledge is a comfortable lead, but another candidate could be surging. Who? And FarmVille, Mafia Wars, just how much would you pay for those online games? We give you one heck of a number next.