At the Forum, Simpson strongly defended his record on immigration issues and continues to do so.

He said sees the debate polarized by extremes.

One side uses the image of the Statue of Liberty to argue for unimpeded immigration, an open door policy, he said.

The other side says "shut the door and don't let anybody in."

Simpson said he advocates taking the middle ground.

Simpson said his work on immigration policy in the 1980s legalized nearly 3 million immigrants. "Without my [1986] bill, 3 million people would still be living in a closed, underground society," he said. "And they came out into the sun."

"Eighty percent of what was in my [1995] bill was in the Barbara Jordan report," he said, referring to the commission on immigration chaired by the late Democrat from Texas, the first black woman to serve in the House of Representatives from the deep South.

After Simpson's ascension to the IOP post was announced, a Crimson staff editorial said Simpson's "public stances on immigration make us question, whether, given his politics, he ought to help determine the make-up of speakers and study groups at the Kennedy School."

The editorial was entitled, "Wrong Move to the Right at IOP."

Simpson said the editorial was "a knee-jerk liberal response. "That editorial board is one of the most left-wing out there."

"You want to start slugging that way," Simpson said with a smile, "God, I love to slug. We'll have a debate. Line 'em up."

Yet Simpson said he does not agree with conservatives who bemoan Ivy League schools for their expressed progressivism.

"That's what college is for. It's no different at the University of Wyoming than at Harvard," he said.

"The politics of academia will outstrip the politics of Congress, but if a college or university is not the place for that kind of inculcation and that kind of emphasis, then there is no other place for that," Simpson said.

"That's the way it will always be, hope fully."