In an interview with Fox News’ Brit Hume last week, President Bush said that the Republican Party needed to be “compassionate” on issues like immigration reform so that the party isn’t “viewed as anti-immigrant.” Asked about that sentiment at a press conference today, Bush said that it might be “fair” to say that “Republicans don’t like immigrants”:
BUSH: Take, for example, the immigration debate. That’s obviously a highly contentious issue. And the problem with the initial outcome of the debate was some people said, “well, Republicans don’t like immigrants.” Now, that may be fair or unfair, but that’s the image that came out. And if, you know, the image is “we don’t like immigrants,” then there’s probably someone else out there saying, “well, if they don’t like immigrants, they probably don’t like me as well.”
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