President Barack Obama and Governor Mitt Romney butted heads on Oct. 16 during the second presidential debate. The candidates rapidly confronted one another over issues on employment, outsourcing and immigration.

The debate was held at Hofstra University in Hempstead, New York. Moderator Candy Crowley kept both Obama and Romney in check as they disagreed over the many of the issues of domestic and foreign policy.

“The president’s policies have been exercised over the last four years and they haven’t put Americans back to work,” Romney said, regarding the unemployment rate in the country. Romney has been continually pushing his vague “five-point” plan throughout all of the debates.

Obama retaliated to Romney’s statement saying that his five-point plan is really a “one-point plan,” which is to make sure the people at the top “play by a different set of rules.” The lack of employment in the country was the biggest domestic policy issue discussed in the debate.

Obama discussed his plan to bring jobs back with three major goals. First, to build manufacturing jobs in the nation again; second, to ensure America has the best education in the world, also ensuring that community colleges offer slots for workers to get retrained; and third, to control our own energy.

“We’ve got to make sure we’re building the energy sources of the future,” Obama stated.

Another conflict discussed was how America can keep manufacturing jobs within the country, and stop this crisis of outsourcing. Romney stated that the main reason for outsourcing today is because “We (U.S.) have made it less attractive for enterprises to stay here than to go offshore from time to time.”

Romney’s goal is to make America attractive to business owners. Romney also places some blame on China for this crisis, saying that they don’t play by the same rules.

He asserted that China artificially holds down the value of their currency. This in effect lowers the price on their goods, which gives them a major advantage in the marketplace.

Obama, however, says that he has been pushing China, stating that “the currency has actually gone up 11 percent since I’ve been president because we have pushed them hard.”

Obama also stated that “we’ve put unprecedented trade pressure on China, which can attribute to the increase in exports. That’s going to help to create jobs here,” he said. Obama also wishes to close loopholes that allow corporations to get tax breaks when they outsource to China.

When the topic moved to immigration, both candidates agreed that the antiquated immigration system in the country is “broken” and needs to be fixed. Obama stated that he has been working on “streamlining” the legal immigration system, so it is easier to go through.

He asserted that he strengthened border patrol and which allowed “the flow of undocumented works across the border is actually lower than it’s been in 40 years.” Obama states that he also wishes to change the priority when it comes to catching illegal immigrants.

“If we’re going to go after folks who are here illegally, we should do it smartly and go after folks who are criminals, gang bangers, people who are hurting the community, not after students, not after folks who are here just because they’re trying to figure out how to feed their families,” he said.

Romney also wishes for the immigration system to be streamlined, saying that people “shouldn’t have to hire a lawyer to figure out how to get into this country legally.” Romney also expressed interest in having people with certain skills come to America.

“We should give visas to people — green cards, rather, to people who graduate with skills that we need. People around the world with accredited degrees in science and math get a green card stapled to their diploma, come to the U.S. of A,” he said.

As for how Romney will stop illegal immigration, he wishes to put in an employment verification system, which will have people, more specifically employers, check if immigrants are here legally. “So for instance, I would not give driver’s licenses to those that have come here illegally as the president would,” he said.