I live and work in the heart of MAGA country, among MAGA friends. Amid stories of recent horrors committed by ICE, a conservative friend regularly objects: “Obama deported more people than Trump. Why is the left so mad now?”

The first few times I heard this, I argued with them. I noted that Republican presidents like Reagan and the Bushes took a much more lenient approach to immigration than Donald Trump. But now I think the more constructive response might be rhetorical judo—using their argument to make our case.

From the perspective of an immigrant advocate, “Deporter in Chief” Obama was certainly far from ideal. Early in his term, a Latino former student and I participated in an immigration march on Washington that had significantly more participants than the quarter-million-person March on Washington.

Taking place before our polarized era, the march was peaceful, joyful, and profoundly hopeful. We chanted an exuberant rhyme: “Obama! Escucha! ¡Estamos en la lucha!” (Listen, Obama! We’re in the fight!)

We hoped to persuade the new president to put immigration reform above health care on his agenda. We failed miserably. Health care came first, and Obama did indeed deport a record number during his first term.

But to an extent, I would say the purpose of his policy matters. Obama wanted to show that a Democrat could be tough, as Bill Clinton had done on crime.

In his second term, Obama shifted his immigration enforcement toward violent criminals and recent arrivals. Having shored up his “law-and-order” credentials (at the expense of many, many good people), he hoped to pass comprehensive reform that would provide a path to citizenship. When this went nowhere, he issued an executive order on Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), shielding young people from deportation under certain conditions.

Obama attempted a second order, Deferred Action for Parents of Americans (DAPA), but the Supreme Court struck it down.

Fast forward to 2026, and thanks to Trump’s divisiveness, the next president may well be a Democrat—or at least a less bombastic Republican. The new president will most likely inherit a very secure border, which I believe Obama and others correctly saw as a precondition for reform to pass.

Though Obama failed in this area, today’s climate may be more ripe for reform than during his second term. Support for hardline policies may be waning.

Trump has overstepped his immigration mandate and generated significant sympathy for the undocumented. Polls show diminished support for ICE.

A consensus seems to be emerging among cultural and political voices on the center right—such as Joe Rogan, Andrew Schulz, and Newt Gingrich—as well as centrists such as Democrat Joe Fetterman, that criminals should be deported but humble, hard-working laborers should be left alone. Surprisingly, perhaps no one put it in better “common-sense” terms than reality star Kim Kardashian, who posted:

“When we’re told that ICE exists to keep us safe and remove violent criminals—great. But when we witness innocent, hardworking people ripped from their families in inhumane ways, we have to speak up. We have to do what’s right…There HAS to be a BETTER WAY.”

She is, of course, correct, and support for her position can certainly be found outside popular culture.

Writing in The Hill, John Dewar Gleissner notes that famed economist and conservative hero Milton Friedman once pointed out the affordability of undocumented immigrants compared to those here legally. While the undocumented take the work nobody else wants, they are not eligible for government benefits.

Dewar proposes tough conditions for reform—tougher than I would prefer—but conditions that could get majority support: deportations for nearly any crime other than illegal border crossing, for not having a job, or for driving without insurance and causing an accident. On the other hand, hard-working, de facto good citizens get to stay. Military service, I might add, should definitely provide a path to permanent residence and even citizenship.

“They committed a crime!” the anti-amnesty crowd will likely say. But Kenneth Roth, a visiting professor at Princeton, notes that many crimes have statutes of limitations. Crossing the border illegally, which nearly any of us would do under the right conditions, seems a perfect candidate for a statute of limitations as part of an immigration deal.

This could garner popular support. In the words of Republican strategist Karl Rove, “Americans have a soft spot for immigrants who work hard and keep their nose clean.”

Political philosopher John Locke would agree. Locke, whose ideas are the most direct source of Jefferson’s Declaration of Independence, argued that we make property ours by mixing our labor with it. Property rights are a hallmark of traditional conservative thought. Surely immigrants who spend years working alongside a community—often doing the hardest but necessary physical labor—make that community theirs and become integral parts of it.

The same would apply to the country as a whole.

And finally, we have Scripture, the source of my and many conservatives’deepest values. Our nihilistic president has tragically led many in his party far away from these values, but the story of the prodigal son—and the gospel itself—tells us that we can be welcomed back when we have been led astray.

Similarly, those in desperate conditions who break one law can, under the right conditions, be forgiven. Scripture views flawed laws with suspicion; it is full of heroes who break the law in the name of their deepest commitments, and villains who are corrupt, greedy rulers or unmerciful, legalistic leaders.

It is my prayer that the time will soon come when there will be another opportunity to right the harm we have done to the strangers in our midst. Nearly all liberals will support compassionate reform. They are joined by influencers in popular culture, leading voices among traditional conservatives, the logic of the Founding Fathers’ thought, and the heart of our Scripture.

The border is secure. Let’s complete the mission Obama began in his second term. 

Estamos en la lucha. Let’s win the fight this time.