The President today spoke on what is clear to us in Arizona: the need for comprehensive immigration reform is urgent.

The President said the right things, in the right ways. We need balanced, careful debate that is ultimately civil and we thank the President for demonstrating a new way forward in this conversation. Inside all of the election year noise we need leaders who can see beyond a merely electoral perspective and put solutions over elections.

But it will have to move beyond talk; we need to see that the administration is serious in tackling this tough issue, and is willing to reassert federal authority to create order out of the chaos of the current immigration system. Inside this chaos Arizona has chosen to take matters into our own hands. The lack of federal action has created a vacuum that we have rushed to fill. As the President mentioned, we cannot have a patchwork of 50 different immigration laws for 50 different states. Our broken system is a national crisis that requires strong and relentless presidential leadership and bold action from the United States Congress.

Our country desperately needs an immigration system that works. Close to a thousand families are being torn apart every single day by a broken immigration system that wastes our tax dollars. Economies that are working to recover need the workers necessary to get back to business.

All of this, I believe our President knows. What he does not have the opportunity to see every day are the faces of families living inside this broken system. As a youth pastor, I cannot sit idly by and watch families being separated and remain silent. We must change our laws. The change must be fair, it must be pragmatic and it also must help us move forward together. What has happened in Arizona recently is only separating us further.

Our Congressional delegation must join the communities of faith, business, labor, and law enforcement across Arizona to find common ground and finally solve this problem once and for all for all Arizonans. This will require principled, integrity-based leadership as this issue we all know can become hotly contested. But the ways we frame the dialogue and the solution-making process make all the difference. Arizonans like Americans in other states want something done about the broken immigration system, but they know we cannot deport ourselves out of this problem.

We are grateful for the leadership demonstrated by the President today but we know that it will take more than just today’s speech. We also know that is going to take more than the President demonstrating leadership and that he needs leaders from both sides of the aisle to likewise step forward. Leadership can help frame the dialogue in more helpful terms and put Arizona and America first above electoral interests. The alternative is more division that will only separate and enflame our community further.

+Ask the U.S. Senate to pass national immigration reform this year.