The top House Republicans who oversee immigration policy called President Obama’s expected action this week to grant temporary amnesty to illegal immigrants a “slap in the face to the American people and the Constitution” in a letter sent Wednesday.
Judiciary Committee Chairman Robert W. Goodlatte and Homeland Security Committee Chairman Michael McCaul sent the president the letter to register their objections and pleading with him to work with them instead on legislation.
“Let’s secure the border, enforce our immigration laws in the interior of the United States, and build a broad consensus for immigration reform,” the two said. “Otherwise, as the chairmen of the committees with oversight over border security and our nation’s immigration laws, we will be forced to use the tools afforded to Congress by the Constitution to stop your administration from successfully carrying out your plan.”
The two chairmen didn’t say what tools they have — and most analysts say that short of a difficult fight over canceling funding for the president’s favored projects, Congress is toothless. The courts, meanwhile, have been reluctant to referee these disputes.
For his part Mr. Obama has said he’s given Congress enough chances to act, and he must go it alone now.
The president has said he still welcomes Congress’s action next year, and anything they do will supersede his own actions, but in the meantime he is deporting illegal immigrants he doesn’t think deserve to be deported.
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• Stephen Dinan can be reached at sdinan@washingtontimes.com.
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