Rove discusses Bush

President George W. Bush's former deputy chief of staff received a warm Texas welcome Thursday evening at the University of Texas of the Permian Basin.

Karl Rove, former senior adviser and chief strategist to Bush, spoke to a packed UTPB gymnasium of about 1,500 people, addressing issues from working in the White House to immigration reform to the 2008 presidential election.

Rove, who resigned from one of the Bush administration's top positions in August, spoke as part of the John Ben Shepperd Public Leadership Institute's Distinguished Lecture Series. He answered questions from moderator Melissa Francis, senior news analyst with CNBC. Francis also relayed some audience member questions.

In October 2006, the JBS Leadership Institute hosted former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev as part of the lecture series.

To work in the White House, Rove said, meant long days and trusting and respecting his colleagues.

"Or it gets ugly pretty darn fast," he said.

Many of his colleagues, such as Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and U.S. Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings, would come in early in the morning and many times the staff wouldn't leave for the day until 9 p.m. Rove said he saw this as the president's cabinet being devoted to their country and working in the "foxhole" for long hours.

"The best thing about the White House were the people I got to work with," Rove said.

And the White House was awe-inspiring to some political leaders who visited it, he said, naming Russian leader Vladmir Putin as being one of those.

Rove recalled Putin as a former KGB agent and an atheist who when he entered the Oval Office of the White House the first words to escape his lips were: "Oh my God!"

"That Office is that powerful in influence," Rove said.

Rove also touched on a variety of political issues.

On immigration reform, Rove said the details haven't been explained to the American public well and to be successful the government will need to reduce the pressures on the border with a temporary worker program.

Rove said the U.S. Border Patrol will need to be doubled and the budget tripled with 300 miles of fence built. The sensors and infrared cameras already exist along the border, he said.

Rove said recently 1.3 million immigrants entered this country and only one-third came by way of the Rio Grande River. Many others entered the country on a visa from places such as Hong Kong and London and just overstayed their visits, he said.

Before Bush took office, Rove said, the U.S. government only gave immigrants a notice to appear at an immigration hearing - and only 8 percent would show. The remaining 92 percent just went on with their lives in this country, he said.

He said many people who stay in the United States often don't have current ties to their own countries.

"We've got to break that cycle," Rove said.

In the 2008 election, Rove said he favored whomever the Republican nominee will be to win. Although, when asked, he did say Presidential Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton could have a chance at winning because she has a "machine around her."

"She'll be tough - absolutely," he said.

Before the event, four art students stood outside the UTPB gym and quietly protested the Rove event.

UTPB art sophomore Lori Head, 29, hugged and kissed art sophomore Sarah Cox, 19, as attendees walked by. Each said they were there to celebrate the freedoms they have.

"I'm just here to let people in Odessa know this is not a totally conservative area," Head said. "There are people in Odessa who are individuals and we have our own original thoughts."

Brent Blackburn, 33, of Midland, was one of many attendees to give Rove a standing ovation at the end of the event.

Blackburn said he could relate to Rove in that they both didn't graduate from college, and he found it inspiring that Rove could be so successful without a degree.

"He seems to be truly patriotic," Blackburn said. "He seems to love his country. Like him or dislike him he's a great American."