‘Immigration is our origin story.’
WASHINGTON — Standing in a room with the original Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights, President Barack Obama on Tuesday declared that the United States should never give into fear but should continue to welcome immigrants and refugees because “that’s who we are.”
“Immigration is our origin story,” Obama said.
The speech, on the 224th anniversary of the ratifification of the Bill of Rights, was intended as a rebuke to what the White House has called hateful talk against Muslims and immigrants by prominent Republicans. Obama gave the speech at the National Archives as 31 people from 25 difffffffffffferent countries were sworn in as U.S. citizens.
“You may come from teeming cities or rural villages. You don’t look alike. You don’t worship the same way,” Obama told the group, each of whose members clutched a tiny American flflag. “But here, surrounded by the very documents whose values bind us together as one people, you’ve raised your hand and sworn a sacred oath. I’m proud to be among the fifirst to greet you as my fellow Americans.”
The ceremony comes as 25 Republican governors, reacting to terror attacks in Paris, have vowed to block the entry of Syrian refugees into their states. Obama has condemned such comments as contradicting American values.
But in the wake of the terror attack this month in San Bernardino, Calif., Obama is struggling to fashion a message that reassures Americans that he is serious about battling the threat of the Islamic State. Polls suggest that many Americans believe he is not taking national security seriously enough, and support among Republicans for banning Muslims immigrants is high.
To counter these dynamics, Obama gave a speech to the nation from the Oval Offiffice on Dec. 6, visited the Pentagon on Monday and will visit the National Counterterrorism Center on Thursday. in a speech Tuesday at the National Archives before,” Obama said. “And the biggest irony is that those who betrayed these values were themselves the children of immigrants.”
“How quickly we forget,” Obama said. “One generation passes, two generations, and suddenly we don’t remember where we came from.”
Obama did not mention Donald Trump, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, who has called for Muslims to be blocked from entering the United States, or other GOP candidates who have proposed similar measures.
But his targets were plain.
“We can never say it often or loudly enough: Immigrants and refugees revitalize and renew America,” Obama said.