Mark Shurtleff, highly conservative Republican and attorney general of the state of Utah, has come out in favor of Obama’s immigration move.

‘Law enforcement makes decisions based on the resources available to them — until Congress acts, we’ll be left with too many people to deport,’ Shurtleff said. ‘The administration is saying, `Here’s a group we could be spending our resources going after, but why? They’re Americans, they see themselves as Americans, they love this country.”

Shurtleff added that the decision, by allowing children brought here illegally to go to school and work, could encourage them to stay out of gangs — which he called a ‘conservative’ goal. He dismissed the claim that this would encourage further illegal immigration, noting that the president’s plan has a cutoff — you are only eligible if you came here before you turned 16 and are younger than 30, and have been in the country for at least five continuous years.

Asked to respond to the case made by some that this constitutes ‘amnesty’ because it gives illegal immigrants the legal status they were trying to steal, he rejected it.

‘You’re not giving [legal status] to the parents who came here,’ Shurtleff said. ‘You’re giving it to the child who was brought here. That child didn’t get to choose.’

washingtonpost.com

What is it about Utah? Huntsman, now this guy. Rubio’s said good things about the immigration issue as well. Meanwhile, Rush is picking up Allen West’s idea and claiming that the policy is “Catch, release, vote”, a massive conspiracy to steal the 2012 election. Let the GOP infighting begin!

This was a political master stroke as well as good policy by Obama.