July 7, 2006: Text of Bush’s news conference (AP)

  • See, it’s against the law to hire somebody who is here illegally. And the American people expect us to enforce the law, and we will.
  • I spend a lot of time worrying about the war on terror. I think about it every single day. It’s my biggest job, frankly, is to protect the American people.
  • Geneva Conventions were set up to deal with armies of nation-states and, kind of, standard rules of war. So this is new ground. This is different than any president has been through before in terms of how to deal with these kind of people that you’re picking up off a battlefield and trying to protect the American people from.
  • The truth of the matter is, all of these issues are our problem. And if we became isolationists we would not do our duty to protect the American people and, kind of, lay the foundations for a better world.
  • And here’s how you win elections. You win elections by believing something. You win elections by having a plan to protect the American people from terrorist attacks. You win elections by having a philosophy that has actually produced results: with economic growth, for example; or, you know, kind of, changing the school systems for the better or providing prescription drug coverage for elders.
  • And I’m not being critical. I’m just giving you a fact of something I have to deal with in order to make it clear to the American people that the sacrifice of those families is worth it.

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