For comedian George Lopez, immigration reform is no laughing matter.
The Mexican-American star joined HuffPost Live host Josh Zepps on the couch Wednesday morning to promote his new FX sitcom, Saint George, and chat about why he feels immigration reform is necessary but not imminent.
During the interview with Zepps, the comedian took some questions from fans. Opinion Editor at The Daily Dot Nico Lang referenced Lopez’s recent interview with Larry King, in which he referred to U.S. immigration policies as “ignorant,” and asked what the Obama administration could to “fix the broken system.”
“I'm no politician but Barack Obama, I’m going to go out on the line and say, he might not have won without the Latino vote... He relied and used a lot of surrogates, a lot of Latinos were out there campaigning for him and helping him get the vote, but then he is the president who has deported the most people who are here illegally, of all nationalities not all Latinos,” Lopez told Zepps. “You look at that and I think immigration law needs to be reformed, to answer Nico’s question.”
With the help of Latino activists, like actress Eva Longoria, President Barack Obama successfully attained 71 percent of the Latino vote and, with that, a second term in office. Before and after his reelection, however, Obama was highly criticized for his record setting number of deportations.
As the number of deportations since 2009 nears 2 million, advocates continue to call for Obama to use his executive power to stop deportations while Congress mulls over immigration reform. And Lopez isn’t so sure a legislative solution will happen any time soon.
“The reform probably won’t come before [Obama] leaves,” Lopez said during his interview on HuffPost Live “And it's not necessarily a Latino thing. We're not the poster people of illegal immigration, there are people from all different countries all over the world.”
When asked by Zepps why he thinks that Latinos are so often associated with illegal immigration, the comedian was quick to say it boils down to simple proximity.
“That’s easy, [it’s] because we are so close, we’re right there,” Lopez answered. “But I’ll tell you this, my grandfather worked very hard. People come from other countries... and they come to America for a better life. That better life is challenged now because we hire the people to do the work, and to raise the kids, and to clean the hotels, and to clean the office buildings but then turn a blind eye to what they want and they need.”
Check out Lopez take on immigration above and the entire interview below.
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