President Barack Obama was right when he said on May 10, 2011, “sometimes when I talk to immigration advocates, they wish I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself. But that’s not how a democracy works.” And when he said, on March 28, 2011, “with respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive order, that’s just not the case, because there are laws on the books that Congress has passed.”
Those quotes are from before his re-election. Apparently his belief about “how democracy works” was a ploy. Now, he wants to unilaterally rewrite immigration law, and illegally grant amnesty to millions. Since he was reelected, and (apparently) once his Democrat colleagues get through the midterms, he now believes he can suspend deportations for anyone and ignore immigration law altogether. And for the benefit of the Constitutional professors among us, there is no magical section of the Constitution that says a president can use executive power if Congress fails to enact his will.
Our Republic will not long survive if we continue to allow a president to defy the Constitution, let alone the will of the people. Congress will have a chance to act in December. We can write a provision that specifically defunds any action the President may take to weaken enforcement of immigration law. One such as the amendment I offered in September.
However, if we take another road, and enact an Omnibus appropriations bill that runs the course of the Fiscal Year with no mention of immigration enforcement, Congress will have no leverage. We will not have the ability to exercise the power of the purse, the only power this president appears to respect.
Some say we should wait until after the President has acted. He’s already started.
“When the cat’s away, the mice will play,” as the adage goes, and the Obama Administration is making the moves that Democrats in tight races claim to oppose, while the nation is focused on those tight races.
Now, the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) is already soliciting bids that contemplate a “surge” scenario where a bidder would need to handle 9 million new immigration I.D. cards “to support possible future immigration reform initiative requirements” and a total of 34 million over five years. Of course, this Request for Proposal contemplates an action the President is already planning. He has laid the groundwork to make sure he can print an extra 9 million documents for those he plans to amnesty.
Additionally, they have already announced extensions of Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for Honduras and Nicaragua nationals that will grant them work permits, along with a program to push 100,000 Haitians to the front of the line so they can enter the United States and “legally” work.
Recently, President Obama proudly declared, “make no mistake; my policies are on the ballot, every one of them.” That means everyone has a chance to vote for or against his vision for America. This is absolutely correct. The President has promised to violate his oath to the Constitution, the oath he took on Jan 20, 2013, and his word as late as March 28, 2011.
We are now seeing the outline for his future lawlessness. I have been one of the vanguard moving to defund unconstitutional executive action and urge everyone interested in defending the Constitution to step up and guard a post. This winter will be a pivotal moment in the President’s attempt to obfuscate the meaning of the Constitution and steal power for himself.
Congress must act. Use the power of the purse. Restore the Constitution. Refurbish the pillars of American Exceptionalism.
Now.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.