Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said Tuesday afternoon that the plan revealed by Speaker John Boehner’s border crisis working group will not solve the crisis because it doesn’t stop President Barack Obama’s planned executive amnesty for illegal aliens.
“The evidence shows that the amnesty President Obama announced in 2012 is driving record numbers of immigrants to enter our nation illegally,” Cruz said in a statement his office released. “Because of President Obama’s amnesty, children are being abused and exploited by dangerous drug cartels and transnational gangs. We must put an end to any expansion of this amnesty that puts countless numbers of vulnerable individuals, both immigrants and U.S. citizens alike, at risk. The only way to stop the border crisis is to stop Obama’s amnesty. It is disappointing the border security legislation unveiled today does not include language to end Obama’s amnesty. Congress cannot hope to solve this problem without addressing the fundamental cause of it.”
Boehner’s working group, which is led by Rep. Kay Granger (R-TX), did not include language from a bill Cruz and Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) offered. Their bill would block funding for the administration to implement amnesty via executive order through continuation or expansion of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL), the ranking member of the Senate Budget Committee, has called on lawmakers to back Cruz-Blackburn or remain “complicit” in the “nullification of our borders.”
Sessions on Tuesday also blasted the Boehner-Granger plan, saying it was a “surrender to a lawless president.”
“Any action Congress might consider to address the current border crisis would be futile should the President go forward with these lawless actions,” Sessions said. “Congress must speak out and fight against them. It must use its spending power to stop the President’s executive amnesty. That the House leaders’ border package includes no language on executive actions is surrender to a lawless President. And it is a submission to the subordination of congressional power.”
President Obama is reportedly considering using executive orders to expand DACA to between 5 and 6 million illegal aliens, up from the 800,000 he previously granted executive amnesty to with DACA.
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