US Politics: The Chief Executive's Immigration Smackdown

[sologdin]

1987

By executive order, rescinded deportation of 200,000 Nicaraguans.

1987

By executive order, deferred deportation of undocumented children of 100,000 families

Both executive orders were after an immigration bill was law. That's the point. It was in RESPONSE to a LAW. Obama's is not. Therefore, one cannot point to Reagan and Bush for justification. The attempts to connect them are either intentionally misleading or actual ignorance. Which is it? Considering the recent Gruber comments, I'd be willing to bet it's the intentional misleading of the "stupid Americans" on the left.

dude, executive orders are law. they don't have to hang from a statute.

[sToNED_CAT]

Congress has appropriated funds to deport about 400,000 people a year, while at the same time giving explicit statutory authority to the Department of Homeland Security to determine enforcement and prosecution priorities. The result of this is that it has already been the case that we only deport the recently arrived or the criminal, as a matter of basic sense. Congress clearly anticipates that the executive will be unable to deport everyone, and invites the executive to exercise discretion. Deferred action has always been exercised by executive discretion, and the executive is specifically authorized to grant work permits to people under deferred action. All of this is in harmony with Congress' intent. Obama's reaction is exactly the same as Reagan's reaction to gaps in the 1986 law.

OK, why did Obama himself say actions like this one are unconstitutional just few years ago?

[OnionAhaiReborn]

OK, why did Obama himself say actions like this one are unconstitutional just few years ago?

Because he's a politician and he was trying to deflect requests from immigrant advocates that he take this kind of action. Presumably because at that point he was trying to negotiate with Congress to pass legislation (the Dream Act and the bipartisan bill that passed the Senate), and didn't want to take an action which would anger Republicans and also wanted to take the rhetorical tack of pressuring Congress to act by saying only they had the power (which he still points to in talking about the limitations of his executive order). So, yes, Obama has contradicted himself somewhat on this issue. That's a problem for him politically, it has no bearing on the actual legality.

[Seli]

OK, why did Obama himself say actions like this one are unconstitutional just few years ago?

Wasn't that with regard to a full full legalization of the immigration status? This executive order seems to do nothing like that at all.

[Commodore]

if Obama has decided he doesn't need them, there are things Congress can do short of impeachment/shutdown, both symbolic and substantive

1) Censure vote, get Dems up in 2016/2018 on record supporting/rejecting the executive action

2) no invite to deliver SOTU to Congress. It's a disgusting regal spectacle to begin with, and why roll out the red carpet for someone who has nothing but contempt for you?

3) no non-security nominees get a vote in the Senate

4) pass multiple smaller spending bills rather than a large omnibus, and attach a rider to the DHS bill forbidding money spent processing illegals (SSNs, work permits, etc.). If Obama wants to veto the DHS bill and claim the GOP is shutting down the DHS, no one will care.

[Kalbear]

At any rate, SC, he has made the case against his action pretty clear as your quotes show

he didn't. He can not suspend deportation. He can, however, choose to emphasize deporting others first.

Which is what he has done.

[OnionAhaiReborn]

if Obama has decided he doesn't need them, there are things Congress can do short of impeachment/shutdown, both symbolic and substantive

1) Censure vote, get Dems up in 2016/2018 on record supporting/rejecting the executive action

2) no invite to deliver SOTU to Congress. It's a disgusting regal spectacle to begin with, and why roll out the red carpet for someone who has nothing but contempt for you?

3) no non-security nominees get a vote in the Senate

4) pass multiple smaller spending bills rather than a large omnibus, and attach a rider to the DHS bill forbidding money spent processing illegals (SSNs, work permits, etc.). If Obama wants to veto the DHS bill and claim the GOP is shutting down the DHS, no one will care.

The Republicans may try some of these things, but there is absolutely no way they are going to to refuse to invite the President to deliver the State of the Union Address. It would be seen- quite accurately- as an unbelievably petty and peevish decision.

[DanteGabriel]

Are you really so full of bigotry and hatred that this the only kind of response that you can respond to?

That is your only kind of response to someone who disagrees with you politically.

Instead of just answering a question you go on a rant and accuse the opponent with baseless accusations.

I now know your playbook. Redirect/assume and accuse. Not smart debating skills brother.

I disagree with plenty of people politically and remain civil. I give your questions and your arguments the respect they deserve. I've known your playbook for a while.

[Altherion]

Check out this different usage of "prosecutorial discretion":

The federal government until recently shielded big banks from criminal prosecution out of concern that convictions may damage the financial system, a top Federal Reserve official said Friday, explicitly acknowledging a policy long denied by the Obama administration.

...

Until May, large financial institutions investigated for wrongdoing had dodged criminal prosecution under the Obama administration, despite evidence from federal regulators and prosecutors showing that big banks had, for instance, laundered money for suspected terrorists and drug cartels; manipulated interest rate benchmarks; rigged various commodities markets; mislead investors in mortgage-linked securities; duped homeowners into taking out expensive mortgages; manipulated municipal debt markets; and broke state and federal rules when attempting to seize homes after borrowers fell behind on their payments, a scandal that became known as "robosigning."

...

“We were not willing to find those firms guilty before, because we were worried that if we found them guilty, that could somehow potentially destabilize the financial system,” Dudley said.

They picked a perfect time to announce this: between the immigration executive order and the Ferguson scandal, the only way it will be widely heard is if one of the comedians (Stewart, Colbert, Oliver, etc.) puts it on their show.

[Ser Scot A Ellison]

Sologdin,

dude, executive orders are law. they don't have to hang from a statute.

That's an oversimplification. Surely, you aren't saying the President has the power to issue an Executive Order with no foundation in existing statute or some power granted to the President in the Constitution. Executive Orders are not carte blanche to do anything.

[The Fallen]

OK, why did Obama himself say actions like this one are unconstitutional just few years ago?

Admittedly, I'm not inside Obama's head. But a couple of things stand out Obama's previous statements regarding the legality of the Executive Order.

One, people were urging him to do it. Were these people urging him to break the law? Or were they urging him to act in a way that conforms and is consistent with the precedent that has already been set?

Two, I think Obama knew he couldn't or didn't want to act at the time that he was being urged to do so. Instead of saying, "Hey, I know I promised this, but now is not the time. Healthcare first, then I'll work on immigration," he made it look as if he couldn't do it.

I haven't compared the language before and after, but I'd be surprised if there wasn't enough of a distinction that could hold up under scrutiny.

[Commodore]

Three, the voters could still respond.

Had he done this a few weeks ago, Scott Brown and Ed Gillespie would be senators.

[Ned Snow]

Disclaimer: I don't want to get into any sort of ideological debate. I'm strictly talking from a non-partisan perspective here.

Here's my view on this EO. The President knows it probably won't survive judicial scrutiny, and that judicial scrutiny is a certainty. It seems to me like he's just trying to cause a stir so that Congress will act before he leaves the white house, so he can either sign Immigration Reform into law OR veto it if he doesn't like it. He doesn't want to leave it up to the next President, especially after a disastrous mid-term election.

I know this seems obvious, that this is all bluster on the President's part. But some people are accusing him of destroying the constitution. Folks, reasonable, intelligent, minds can disagree on how the Constitution ought to be interpreted. Read the document from cover to cover. It's a lot of things, but CLEAR is not one of them in most instances. If you think you know exactly what the Constitution says and what it doesn't, you should be on the Supreme Court so you can teach Scalia and Ginsburg to just get along. (Aside: I love how they're such good friends even though they are agree on just about nothing ideologically. People should take an example from them).

The President is just using the tools he has available to him to put the squeeze on Congress to figure out the immigration problem...because that is their job. We voted them into office to make these hard decisions for us. Whether or not you think they can do it is another story. But they must pass legislation. Doing nothing is unacceptable.

I have no comment on whether or not I think it's okay for the President to do this, but when you're enumerated powers are as threadbare as the Executive Branch's are, and your average American blames everything on the President because he's an easy target, you need to dig a little deeper into your playbook to get things done. It's understandable.

[Commodore]

The President is just using the tools he has available to him to put the squeeze on Congress to figure out the immigration problem...because that is their job. We voted them into office to make these hard decisions for us. Whether or not you think they can do it is another story. But they must pass legislation. Doing nothing is unacceptable.

No, the Founders designed a system that encourages gridlock and requires large consensus to change policy. If Congress must do something, the voters will make that known.

We don't have a parliamentary system.

[Ned Snow]

No, the Founders designed a system that encourages gridlock and requires large consensus to change policy. If Congress must do something, the voters will make that known.

We don't have a parliamentary system.

Yeah, I'm aware of that. Notice how I said I'm not describing my own opinions. I'm just giving my opinion of what seems to be happening.

[DanteGabriel]

Oops, GOP:

A two-year investigation by the Republican-controlled House Intelligence Committee has found that the CIA and the military acted properly in responding to the 2012 attack on a U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, and asserted no wrongdoing by Obama administration appointees.

Debunking a series of persistent allegations hinting at dark conspiracies, the investigation determined that there was no intelligence failure, no delay in sending a CIA rescue team, no missed opportunity for a military rescue, and no evidence the CIA was covertly shipping arms from Libya to Syria.

In the immediate aftermath of the attack, intelligence about who carried it out and why was contradictory, the report found. That led Susan Rice, then U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, to inaccurately assert that the attack had evolved from a protest, when in fact there had been no protest. But it was intelligence analysts, not political appointees, who made the wrong call, the committee found. The report did not conclude that Rice or any other government official acted in bad faith or intentionally misled the American people.

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/republican-benghazi-investigation-debunks-conspiracy-theories-clears-obama-hillary

Of course this was released the Friday before Thanksgiving, to bury it in the news cycle. Because who'd want to draw attention to the fact that the House GOP spent so much time and money repeatedly investigating the same goddamn manufactured scandal only to turn up fuck-all?

Not that this will stop the committed water-carriers and Fox diehards from continuing to believe that Benghazi was a huge scandal.

[DanteGabriel]

Psst. The right wing crank brigade on my Facebook feed just posted a meme, earlier today, loudly proclaiming "IT SHOULD BE VETERANS BEFORE ILLEGALS. DO YOU AGREE?" So yeah, go ahead and claim you're just asking a simple question and want people's thoughts on it. It's just another right wing bullshit point that SYC helpfully carried into this thread, and managed to get a couple of pages of discussion out of. Well done, water-carrier.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

Psst. The right wing crank brigade on my Facebook feed just posted a meme, earlier today, loudly proclaiming "IT SHOULD BE VETERANS BEFORE ILLEGALS. DO YOU AGREE?" So yeah, go ahead and claim you're just asking a simple question and want people's thoughts on it. It's just another right wing bullshit point that SYC helpfully carried into this thread, and managed to get a couple of pages of discussion out of. Well done, water-carrier.

WHAT ABOUT THE CHILDREN?!?! WON'T SOMEBODY PLEASE THINK OF THE CHILDREN?!?!

[BloodRider]

What a waste of time and manpower in desperate pursuit of something they can use to smear.

Well it paid off in spades with Clinton.

[theprincethatwasntpromised]

Since we're rehashing scandals...

http://m.washingtonexaminer.com/30k-missing-irs-emails-recovered/article/2556522