Sen. Nelson supports the principles of a bipartisan group of senators seeking immigration reform and U.S. border security. He believes we simply cannot deport 11 million people. That would be unreasonable. It would ruin our economy. But anyone who is here must follow the rules, pay taxes, learn English and go to the end of the line. If they do that, they should have a shot at citizenship. And those who are unwilling to do that, they should be sent home. We also need to make sure that children who through no fault of their own know no other country but ours can stay here to go to college or serve in the military. The bottom line is: we’re talking about fairness.
Fiscal Cliff
Sen. Nelson feels it was something we had to do to keep the country from going over the fiscal cliff and to prevent income taxes from going up for more than 95 percent of folks. Now he believes we’ve got to finish the job of fixing our country’s financial ills with more targeted spending cuts and reforming our tax code.
Bush-era tax cuts
Sen. Nelson supports permanently extending the Bush-era tax cuts that are due to expire at the end of this year for everybody making less than $1 million a year.
Health-care reform decision
Sen. Nelson feels the health-care law wasn’t perfect. But it was needed. The system was broken and we had to do something. Insurance companies were refusing to cover people or dropping those who got sick. So, we passed legislation to prevent insurers from running roughshod over people. And, the Supreme Court upheld most of these reforms.
President's new immigration policy
Sen. Nelson supports tough, fair, practical immigration laws that require people who want to become citizens to obey our laws, learn English, and get in line for citizenship. He also supports the DREAM Act, which says no law should punish children because their parents brought them here. If a child of an immigrant has worked hard and graduated from high school, they should able to go into the military or attend college.
Defense Spending
Because the Super Committee was unsuccessful, there automatically will be a half-trillion dollars more in defense cuts. President Obama and Defense Secretary Panetta have laid out a strategy for coping with these cuts in a way that’s designed to deal with current and anticipated threats. While Sen. Nelson thinks it needs to be reviewed, there clearly are savings that can be achieved in defense spending, just as in everything else. Still, when you get right down to it, the Pentagon budget must continue to be fully sufficient for a simple reason: we have to protect our country.