In interviews aired over the weekend, Fox 31 Denver's Eli Stokols tried hard to clarify Rep. Mike Coffman's squirrelly positions on immigration reform, but unfortunately, after you watch the interviews, you're left scratching your head on key points.
For example, during Stokols' Sunday show, #CoPolitics from the Source, Coffman comes out against President Obama's executive order allowing young undocumented immigrants, brought here illegally as children, to defer deportation for at least two years.
These are the so-called Dreamers, who know only America as their home.
"I certainly don't support it being done by executive order," Coffman told Stokols, which makes sense because Coffman voted to defund Obama's order this summer. "I believe it should be done legislatively."
So, in the absence of DACA legislation, you'd think Coffman believes the Dreamers should be deported.
Yet, in a news piece aired last night, Stokols also has video of Coffman saying he supports deferred deportations. Right, that's the opposite of what he said before.
In Stokols' news story, a young man identifies himself as a Dreamer and asks Coffman why he voted last summer to defund Obama's program to defer deportations.
"I thought we had an opportunity to make it permanent," Coffman told the young man, neglecting to add he opposes Obama's executive order.
Putting on his immigration happy face, Coffman also told Stokols that he supports granting Dreamers a path to citizenship through "higher education."
These are the same Dreamers who would be deported if Coffman had his way and Obama's protective policy were removed!
"I certainly support a path [to citizenship] for some of the young people that do higher education and do military service," Coffman said.
But how to do this if you're a Dreamer and you're deported!
In the past, incidentally, Coffman favored granting citizenship to Dreamers only through military service, not through education. So this is new.
Coffman is competing against Democrat Andrew Romanoff in one of the most hotly contested congressional races in the country.
The Aurora district was re-drawn in 2010, changing it from a safe Republican seat to a tossup.
Coffman told Stokols "there needs to be more districts" like his, where competitive elections force politicians not to get stuck in ideological straight jackets. But earlier this year Coffman implied that the judge who okayed Coffman's district was swayed by his affiliation with the Democratic party--though it turned out the judge wasn't even a registered Democrat.
"I think it's made me a better Congressman," Coffman told Stokols, referring to the competition he's facing from Romanoff.
But as Coffman's shifting positions emerge, reporters like Stokols have their work cut out for them to get Coffman to explain the precise stances that make him the better Congressman he says he is.
Does he want to deport the Dreamers or not? Not an easy question for Coffman, it appears.