Latinos and Democrats Press Obama to Curb Deportations

With prospects for an immigration overhaul looking dim, President Obama is facing increasing pressure from Latinos, Democratic lawmakers and immigrant groups to use his executive powers to offer relief from deportation to broad groups of illegal immigrants.
Politicians and activists alike are demanding the President to slow the pace of immigration crackdown in Latino communities. Latinos and Democrats want congress to pass a y bill pertaining to the overhaul legislation which would grant millions of illegal immigrants, however, with the house being mostly Republicans who strongly oppose the bill it doesn't look like it will be passed any time soon. Since the Republicans strongly oppose this bill, it's supporters have become and remain skeptical that it will go anywhere before the presidential election next year.
Many are calling on Mr. Obama to use his authority and utilize the current immigration law to defer deportations of illegal immigrant students who would be eligable for legal status under a bill known as the Dream Act.
"We know that immigration reform is doable, but it is just rather difficult given the makeup of Congress," said Representative Charlie Gonzalez, Democrat of Texas, who is chairman of the Hispanic Caucus in the House. "We are asking the president if he could provide some sort of relief to innocent people who are the most impacted by the inequities of the immigration system."
Arguments and pleas of all sorts are being made and asked of President Obama so that many of the illigal immigrants living in the U.S. can become legal. Religious and civil rights groups have asked Mr. Obama to expand waivers that would make it easier for illegal immigrants who are immediate relatives of American citizens to fix thier legal status without having to leave the United States. Senater John Kerry has also written a letter asking the Obama administration to postpone deportations of immigrants in same-sex marriges with Americans. Also, many Latinos and Hispanic lawmakers have said that the president should halt deportations of illegal immigrants whose children are American citizens. "An estimated four million young citizens have at least one parent who is an illegal immigrant."
The Obama administration has deported nearly 1 million illigal immigrants from the U.S. in the last 2 years (nearly 400,000 each year) and these deportations have lead to irate protests from Latino communities. Republicans say that the numbers should be even higher than that for deportation while many Demicrats are beginning to lead towards legalizing more immigrants.
"At the end of the day, the president cannot fix administratively what is broken in the immigration system," said a senior White House official, who was not authorized to speak publicly on the issue. The official said the White House had made a strategic decision to focus all its efforts on passing the overhaul rather than acting unilaterally to make smaller changes. President Obama first rejected executive action to suspend deportations, but now calls for him to change his mind have begun to rapidly increase as a more and more people push toward suspending deportations of illigal immigrants. 34,448 deportation suspentions were issued last year, and now many aim to not only increase that number, but also legalize those immigrants.

Questions:
1. Do you think that illegal immigrants living in the U.S. should be granted legal status? Why or why not?
2. What would be the consequences/reprocussions of either letting them stay or deporting them?
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/us/politics/21immigration.html?_r=1&adxnnl=1&ref=us&adxnnlx=1303470046-CTgXRrUtXmkgMedLTd2Tjw