Washington Times (Editorial)
January 21, 2016
Barack
Obama is about to find out whether he’s a power unto himself or merely a
president. His immigration orders will be held up against the standard
of the U.S. Constitution,
tattered and oft-ignored as it may be. The outcome, depending on the
reckoning of the United States Supreme Court, could begin the rebuilding
the nation’s broken immigration system and the redrawing, in vivid red
ink, of a bright boundary marking the limits
of the authority of the chief executive.
The
Supreme Court agreed Tuesday to take up United States v. Texas, which
questions whether President Obama broke the law when he ordered an
amnesty that blocked deportation
of 4 million illegal immigrants who are the parents of U.S. citizens,
and gave them work permits. The administration claimed that Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA)
was practical assistance for illegals whose family
situations make them a low priority for deportation.
But
Texas, joined by 25 other states, sued, arguing that compliance would
burden them with heavy costs. Moreover, the court will examine the
larger question of whether
such orders amount to abandoning the president’s constitutional duty to
“take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”
The
outcome could be decisive in the struggle over immigration policy,
which has pitted open-borders activists inside and outside the Obama
administration against the
states forced to deal with the humanitarian challenges posed by waves
of uninvited immigrants. “This is a great day for millions of immigrants
and their allies,” says Frank Sharry, executive director of America’s
Voice, an immigrant advocacy organization.
“At long last, millions of immigrants will have a full and fair hearing
before the highest court in the land.”
Lawyers
for Mr. Obama say he was “compelled” to act on immigration reform when
Congress did not do so, but the states argue the president has no
constitutional right to
take matters into his own hands. “DAPA is a crucial change in the
nation’s immigration law and policy — and that is precisely why it could
be created only by Congress, rather than unilaterally imposed by the
executive,” wrote Texas Attorney Gen. Ken Paxton
in court papers.
Congress,
not the president, has further authority over the nation’s purse
strings. The annual costs of illegal immigration at the federal, state
and local level is estimated
at $113 billion by the Federation for American Immigration Reform. The
Heritage Foundation reckons that if the 12 million illegals currently in
the United States were allowed to stay the net value of government
benefits they would enjoy over their lifetimes
would reach $6.3 trillion.
The
president has two strikes against him. U.S. District Judge Andrew S.
Hanen in Brownsville, Texas, issued an injunction barring the Department
of Homeland Security
from administering the president’s executive order last February, and
the U.S. 5th Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans concurred in
November.
The
High Court should call the third strike, foiling the administration’s
scheme to seize power not in the Constitution. Failing to secure the
nation’s borders, then issuing
orders that would manage the chaos, is the mark of a brazen globalist.
The president contends everyone is a “citizen of the world.” Humanity
indeed shares a planet, but every American deserves the right to open
his door to guests and to close it to the uninvited.
The alternative is an unruly neighborhood.
For more information, go to: www.beverlyhillsimmigrationlaw.com
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