Jeb Bush Defends Comments Calling Illegal Immigration ‘Act Of Love’

Former Republican governor of Florida and possible 2016 presidential candidate Jeb Bush defended earlier comments in which he called illegal immigration an “act of love,” rousing the ire of some conservatives. At a speech during the Prescott Bush Award dinner -- named for his grandfather -- held in Connecticut on Thursday night, Bush repeated his call for comprehensive immigration reform, framing it as “a huge opportunity” for the United States’ economy, and urged Americans to have “sensitivity to the immigrant experience."

Bush, the son of George H.W. Bush and younger brother of George W. Bush -- whose push in 2001 for comprehensive reform has yet to be enacted 13 years later -- had qualified illegal immigration as “a different kind of crime” during an event at his father’s presidential library in Texas. "The way I look at this is someone who comes to our country because they couldn't come legally, they come to our country because their families -- the dad who loved their children -- was worried that their children didn't have food on the table,” Bush said, according to CBS. “And they wanted to make sure their family was intact, and they crossed the border because they had no other means to work to be able to provide for their family. Yes, they broke the law, but it's not a felony. It's an act of love.”

On Thursday, he did not back off from his earlier comments, which were expected to rouse the ire of many fellow conservatives. “You know, I’ve been saying this for the last three or four years, I said the exact same thing that I’ve said regularly,” he said. “It is not an American value to allow people to stay in the shadows.” Bush also praised a comprehensive bill passed by the Senate in June before stalling in the Republican-dominated House.