In a ground­break­ing speech, Barack Oba­ma announced this evening that he is using his author­i­ty and dis­cre­tion as Pres­i­dent to end the oppres­sion of over five mil­lion new Amer­i­cans by grant­i­ng them a reprieve from the threat of depor­ta­tion, pro­vid­ed they iden­ti­fy them­selves to the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment and pay their taxes.

Speak­ing from the White House, the Pres­i­dent declared that Amer­i­ca’s immi­gra­tion sys­tem was bro­ken, that Con­gress’ inac­tion was inex­cus­able, and that it was his moral duty to use his author­i­ty as the nation’s chief exec­u­tive to make pur­sue a more sen­si­ble and respon­si­ble approach to enforc­ing our exist­ing laws.

“We expect peo­ple who live in this coun­try to play by the rules,” Oba­ma said. “We expect those who cut the line will not be unfair­ly rewarded.”

“So we’re going to offer the fol­low­ing deal: If you’ve with been in Amer­i­ca more than five years, if you have chil­dren who are Amer­i­can cit­i­zens or ille­gal res­i­dents, if you reg­is­ter, pass a crim­i­nal back­ground check and you’re will­ing to pay your fair share of tax­es, you’ll be able to apply to stay in this coun­try tem­porar­i­ly with­out fear of depor­ta­tion. You can come out of the shad­ows and get right with the law. That’s what this deal is.”

“Now let’s be clear about what it isn’t,” the Pres­i­dent con­tin­ued. “This deal does not apply to any­one who has come to this coun­try recent­ly. It does not apply to any­one who might come to Amer­i­ca ille­gal­ly in the future. It does not grant cit­i­zen­ship or the right to stay here per­ma­nent­ly, or offer the same ben­e­fits that cit­i­zens receive. Only Con­gress can do that. All we’re say­ing is we’re not going to deport you.”

“I know some of the crit­ics of the action call it amnesty. Well, it’s not. Amnesty is the immi­gra­tion sys­tem we have today. Mil­lions of peo­ple who live here with­out pay­ing their tax­es or play­ing by the rules, while politi­cians use the issue to scare peo­ple and whip up votes at elec­tion time. That’s the real amnesty, leav­ing this bro­ken sys­tem the way it is. Mass amnesty would be unfair. Mass depor­ta­tion would be both impos­si­ble and con­trary it to our character. ”

Democ­rats and advo­cates for immi­grants’ rights hailed the speech.

“Tonight Pres­i­dent Oba­ma out­lined humane, nec­es­sary reforms to pro­vide relief to hard-work­ing, law-abid­ing Wash­ing­ton fam­i­lies and to sup­port our state’s econ­o­my, includ­ing the impor­tant agri­cul­tur­al sec­tor,” said Wash­ing­ton Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee. “The plan will also increase bor­der secu­ri­ty and enforce­ment where it should be — against crim­i­nals and indi­vid­u­als who would pose a threat to our nation­al security.”

“I have repeat­ed­ly urged Con­gress to pass com­pre­hen­sive immi­gra­tion reform. The president’s action should not absolve Con­gress of its respon­si­bil­i­ty to act in the face of a bro­ken immi­gra­tion sys­tem. Wash­ing­ton res­i­dents and busi­ness­es have wait­ed long enough for action.”

U.S. Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Suzan Del­Bene concurred.

“Every­one agrees that our immi­gra­tion sys­tem is bro­ken, but after more than a year of refus­ing to act on immi­gra­tion reform leg­is­la­tion, House Repub­li­cans have shown them­selves to be unwill­ing to make progress on this impor­tant issue,” said Del­Bene. “Time and again, they have refused to bring mean­ing­ful leg­is­la­tion to a vote on the House floor. If Repub­li­can lead­ers allowed a vote on H.R. 15, the bipar­ti­san bill that I helped intro­duce, it would like­ly pass by a strong majority.”

“In light of House Repub­li­cans’ con­sis­tent fail­ure to act on immi­gra­tion reform, I under­stand Pres­i­dent Obama’s deci­sion to take rea­son­able steps to pro­vide tem­po­rary relief to the fam­i­lies being torn apart by our cur­rent sys­tem. The Admin­is­tra­tion should focus its lim­it­ed enforce­ment resources on indi­vid­u­als who pose a threat to pub­lic safe­ty, not hon­or stu­dents and work­ers con­tribut­ing to our econ­o­my. We must con­tin­ue the crit­i­cal­ly impor­tant efforts to ensure a secure bor­der and the depor­ta­tion of dan­ger­ous crim­i­nals, and the President’s actions today are con­sis­tent with this priority.”

“The only long-term solu­tion to fix our bro­ken immi­gra­tion sys­tem is for Con­gress to ful­fill its respon­si­bil­i­ty to pass leg­is­la­tion. My com­mit­ment to pass­ing immi­gra­tion reform remains unwa­ver­ing, and I look for­ward to con­tin­u­ing to work with my col­leagues on both sides of the aisle to achieve this goal.”