Politico
By David Kohen
November 9, 2014
Former House
Majority Leader Eric Cantor said on Sunday it would be “incendiary” for
President Barack Obama to alter immigration policy by executive action.
Speaking on NBC’s
“Meet the Press,” the Virginia Republican said, “We’ve heard a lot about
the president saying he’s going to unilaterally act on this question of
an executive order for immigration. If he
does that, that’s incendiary.”
A fellow panelist argued the exact opposite would be true.
Cantor was
speaking in the aftermath of what had to be a bittersweet election
season for him, one that saw the Republican Party post double-figure
gains in the House even as he lost his own seat, to Republican
challenger Dave Brat in a primary. Cantor was part of a panel
discussion that was pondering if bipartisan progress is possible at this
juncture.
"Meet the Press"
host Chuck Todd challenged Cantor’s assertion, wondering if repealing
Obamacare would not be just as provocative.
Cantor rejected
that notion, but that equivalency was supported by fellow panelist
Stephanie Cutter, former deputy campaign manager for Obama.
“That is no way to start a new Republican majority,” Cutter said of efforts to repeal Obamacare again.
The word
“incendiary” then resurfaced in a comment by MSNBC host Jose
Diaz-Balart, who said it would be “very incendiary” for Obama not to act
on immigration, laying the blame on Republicans for the failure
to enact reform.
“I think that the
key here for immigration is that with a loss of Mr. Cantor, among other
things, back then, it was a message that the House should not support
immigration reform,” Diaz-Balart said. “If
they had done it back then, we wouldn’t be dealing about this now. The
president made a promise. I think he’s going to keep it.”
Later in the
program, Cantor circled back to the issue: “We’re going to work together
and the president cannot sign that executive order. He’s going to light
a fuse.”
After his
startling primary defeat in June, Cantor stepped down as majority leader
and subsequently resigned his seat. Republicans retained Cantor’s seat
on Tuesday, with Brat defeating fellow Randolph-Macon
professor Jack Trammell by 24 percentage points.
Cantor ended up being one of only a handful of House Republicans to lose their seats this year, joining Ralph Hall of Texas, Steve Southerland of Florida, Lee Terry of Nebraska and scandal-plagued Vance McAllister of Louisiana.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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