President Barack Obama is again insisting on keeping the pressure on Congress to pass immigration reform… on Spanish-language media.

Obama, in a conference call with Hispanic broadcasters Friday, said he hopes a comprehensive immigration reform bill will take shape by the end of this year or in early 2010.

As has happened in the past, the president has chosen media aimed at the Hispanic population to maintain his presence on this issue, while in mainstream appearances he is busy with other topics, like health care reform or the economy.

According to Spanish-language wire service Agencia EFE, Obama said immigration reform is “something we want to move forward on. (more…)

Feet In 2 Worlds‘ web editor Diego Graglia was a guest today on The Brian Lehrer Show on WNYC, New York Public Radio, to talk about President Barack Obama’s recent statement on Spanish-language radio about his plans to start working on immigration reform this year.

On his interview with Los Angeles-based Eddie “Piolín” Sotelo, the President said he was “very committed” to having the reform passed in Congress. But the news was mostly ignored by English-language media.

As we wrote after the interview, this is not the first time Obama shows this different approach, tailored to the Latino, pro-immigrant audience.

“When he was running for president, virtually the only place where Mr. Obama talked about the issue of immigration was in Spanish-language media,” Feet In 2 Worlds‘ John Rudolph wrote. “His Republican rival, Senator John McCain, followed an almost identical strategy. As a result, consumers of Spanish-language media heard a debate over the two candidate’s positions on immigration that was missing from mainstream media.”

You can listen to Diego’s conversation with Brian Lehrer by pressing play below or you can visit the show’s page here:

[audio:http://audio.wnyc.org/bl/bl030309epod.mp3]

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