Obama’s unilateral change of immigration law
If you want an example of why conservatives don’t believe President Obama’s overtures about working with them, and why he actually is making partisanship worse in this country while he claims to want the opposite, look no further than his administration’s new policy toward “low priority” illegal immigrants.
The policy, first reported by the Washington Times and subsequently confirmed in a publicly released memo from Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, lays out the criteria for prosecutors to exercise discretion about whether to deport an illegal immigrant. The person in question must:
- have entered the country before turning 16;
- have been in the country for at least five years and still be here;
- be in school (the memo doesn’t specify k-12 or college), or be a high school graduate, or have a GED, or have been honorably discharged from the armed services;
- have not been convicted of “a felony offense, a significant misdemeanor offense, multiple misdemeanor offenses” or pose “a threat to national security or public safety”;
- be 30 years old or younger.
Individuals who meet these criteria almost certainly will not be deported. They will not immediately be granted any “substantive right, immigration status or pathway to citizenship” because, in a rare moment of modesty, Napolitano acknowledges the administration can’t go that far in changing the law. But nor can we rule out such a development in the future.
What the administration has done here is short-circuit the legislative process and make a mockery of the idea that he wants to reach compromises with those who think differently about immigration policy.
You may recall that Congress had a heated debate about the DREAM Act, which would have granted a path to citizenship to almost the exact same pool of illegal immigrants. Now, there’s no question the path to citizenship element is a big difference between the two. But nor can anyone deny that Congress, as is its prerogative, has been debating how to change the legal approach to people who were brought to the United States as children — immigrants who arguably did not make the decision to come here illegally and might well be foreigners in their own birth countries if they’ve spent most of their lives here.
There is some sympathy among many conservatives for these child immigrants. But there is also debate about how to make such a policy change without creating an incentive for more illegal immigration. In fact, that is the biggest problem many conservatives — including yours truly — have with making such a policy change. That’s why you hear us talking about making the border more secure first, so that any kind of leniency for illegal immigrants already here does not lead to large number of new illegal immigrants.
With this decision, the Obama administration is dismissing those legitimate concerns. It is antagonizing its critics, who might have helped foster a compromise. And it is undercutting the very notion of a compromise, by taking what it wants without addressing what the other side wants.
Imagine if the president could unilaterally decree higher taxes, and then told conservatives, “OK, now I’ll be happy to talk about spending.” He would have no credibility, because he would already have gotten what he wanted without having to give in on anything.
That’s what’s happened here.
Then there are the details about the policy. Someone who came from Mexico to the U.S. a month before his 16th birthday and is now 21 cannot in any sense be described as someone who knows “only this country as home,” as Napolitano’s memo puts it. These kinds of thresholds for deciding when the law of the land should be ignored are more properly debated in Congress than decreed by an administration. Yes, the memo only grants discretion and doesn’t require it, but it also makes clear a strong preference for ignoring these “low priority cases.”
And let’s not pretend this policy is totally unrelated to this fall’s election. It’s not only brazen pandering to a group whose votes Obama needs desperately, but it is made at the same time his administration is fighting voter ID laws that would prevent, or at least sharply curb, any voting by illegal immigrants. (Apparently, the White House thinks you need to show an ID to listen to your president speak, but not to vote for him.)
Have other presidents single-handedly set policies their political opponents didn’t like? Of course. But most of them didn’t have the chutzpah to continue claiming, three and a half years into a very partisan presidency, that they really, really, really wanted to work with the other side of the aisle.
– By Kyle Wingfield
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288 comments Add your comment
bu2
June 15th, 2012
9:39 pm
Doesn’t look like my quote carried-td’s 2:57 post was right on.
Just saying..
June 15th, 2012
10:11 pm
Complain 1 on this this blog: The President doesn’t lead.
Complaint2: OMG, the President is leading (but I don’t like it).
Just saying..
June 15th, 2012
10:24 pm
Dusty
June 15th, 2012
3:59 pm: “President Obama is implementing no one’s policy initiative but his own.
Don’t try to make President Bush a crook just because Obama doesn’t know what he is going.”
Would it help if the President called it a signing statement?
MarkV
June 15th, 2012
11:00 pm
Dusty @7:27 pm
Poor Dusty,
She has taken a leave of her senses.
Dusty @4:53 pm “I repeat: The president is trying to make lawbreakers (aka illegal immigrants) into legal citizens just before an election. “
Dusty @7:27 pm “I have never suggested that any illegals that are illegal now will be voting in the next election. I said the Hispanics who are LEGAL will be voting and the president is trying to influence them NOW.”
Apparently, Dusty can see the word Hispanics in her quote above, and not see the words “illegal immigrants.”
RIP, Dusty’s senses, or her truthfulness.
zeke
June 16th, 2012
1:30 am
IMPEACH THE MORON!
RegisQuando
June 16th, 2012
7:32 am
Good for Obama. It’s not like anything is to be gained by listening to the useless conservatives posting here who don’t actually do anything for the country in terms of skilled or unskilled labor. Their cries would have a lot more merit if they weren’t complete leeches.
Russell
June 16th, 2012
7:38 am
I think Romney should act just like a Democrap on this one, Simply, LIE LIKE HELL ! Then when he becomes president have a prior executive order rescinding party! Also I would like to go ahead and say this now, When Romney become president and by-passes congress with an executive order that you Democrap’s don’t like, SHUT THE F–K UP!!!
Tiberius - Banned from Bookman's and proud of it!
June 16th, 2012
9:28 am
At some point the liberals on this blog will understand the difference between an executive order and ignoring an established law you have sworn to enforce.
But I doubt it will be anytime soon.
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
9:50 am
Tib-
At some point the Republicans on this blog will understand the difference between an executive order and ignoring an established law you have sworn to enforce. But I doubt it will be anytime soon.
There, fixed your typo.
Tiberius - Banned from Bookman's and proud of it!
June 16th, 2012
9:56 am
Just sayin, many Republicans do.
However, you just proved that YOU do not.
Which was my point to begin with. Thanks for exposing yourself as a moron.
LMAO
June 16th, 2012
10:05 am
No wonder Hannity and FOX News are so popular, as a liberal admitted on this very blog that he was going to listen to Hannity on his ride home. Democrats are their largest audience!
LMAO
June 16th, 2012
10:16 am
Obama – the dumbest President in history! He panders for votes he will get anyway, and will has cemented his alienation of the voters who were sitting on the fence. Anything His Royal Highness Obama can and will be undone in a few months. I have never seen a President so desperate to get out of office and plot his own demise. Democrats – the party of jackasses! LMAO
Dusty
June 16th, 2012
10:46 am
Well, there is obviously a reading comprehension problem here with liberals. You can make a suggestion and they consider it “law”. Then they quibble!
But… Executive order is disorder of what is already legal. Anything, this time, to get around established law to create more Democratic voters, if only by influence.
No wonder the president is trying so hard any way possible to be elected. He has already made a record number of re-election speeches with more to come.. He is not Mr. Popularity any more.because of his exceptionally bad record. .
His administration is even working hard to overcome any states’ rights that disagree with the president, especially immigration The president wants complete rule. Complete! Beware!!
bu2
June 16th, 2012
10:51 am
He comes from Daley’s Chicago, where stealing elections and obeying the law as convenient is a time honored tradition. That’s the political environment he was brought up in.
MarkV
June 16th, 2012
11:13 am
The title itself of Kyle’s article is a lie.
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
11:15 am
Tiberius – Banned from Bookman’s and proud of it!
June 16th, 2012
9:56 am: “Thanks for exposing yourself as a moron.”
And your oft-noted capacity to disagree, without being disagreeable
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
11:18 am
Looking forward to seeing Tib & Dusty just beside themselves with joy for the next four years.
Of Romney’s first term.
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
11:28 am
Extra painful that Obama cribbed the initiative from Rubio’s draft legislation…
saywhat?
June 16th, 2012
11:28 am
More Republican poutrage over sensible, competent governing. Will it ever end?
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
11:37 am
saywhat?
June 16th, 2012
11:28 am: “More Republican poutrage over sensible, competent governing. Will it ever end?”
Not even with a President Obama Lite…
Daperera
June 16th, 2012
2:57 pm
Maybe we need immigration reform, but we certainly don’t need it by “executive order”. I called California’s Senator Boxer’s office and the staffer said that the President was “prioritizing” his enforcement of the law. I think this is called “selective” enforcement. I spent sometime looking through the US Constitution and could find nowhere any reference to “prioritizing” enforcement of the law, any law.
Article 2, Section 3 of the US Constitution under “Duties of the President” states “HE (The President) SHALL TAKE CARE THAT THE LAWS BE FAITHFULLY EXECUTED”, “Faithfully Executed”, not selectively executed, not prioritized. The President, by executive order, is not “faithfully executing” the law, he is changing it and this is not in his purview according the words of the Constitution. Only Congress can do this.
saywhat?
June 16th, 2012
3:26 pm
One small point daperera, the President is only granted by Congress a finite amount of money in the budget to round up deport illegal immigrants, but not enough for all 11.5 million of them. How should it be decided which ones to deport? Should we deport the first random million we can afford to catch, detain and process without regard to any other factors and forget about the other 10.5 million until the following budget year? OR, would the law be more “faithfully executed” if the limited amount of enforcement available were focused on those illegal immigrants with criminal records, or those who have not contributed or shown the likelihood of contributing to the national good?
Again I ask, why do Republicans get their panties in a twist over competent sensible governance?
MarkV
June 16th, 2012
4:53 pm
Daperera @2:57 pm
It requires somewhat more than reading the ability to read the Constitution to understand that prioritizing the enforcement of the law is a normal practice, and that it is not “selective enforcement.” When someone breaks a law, any law, prosecution usually (unless the law specifies otherwise) has wide latitude regarding the consequences, such as what punishment to ask the court to impose. That is a normal “prosecutorial discretion.” President Obama did not change the immigration law. Deportation is not an automatic result of being found to be in the country illegally. The President, in accord with his executive power, simply has decided the criteria for this prosecutorial discretion.
fair and balanced
June 16th, 2012
5:43 pm
Mark V – very well said. The right wing bigots above do not realize that there has been a long history of allowing illegals to gain citizenshil after serving in the military, My father was one of them in WWII,
He escaped the Nazis, jumped ship in NY and eventually got busted. The judge using the same discretion as the black man in the White House allowed him to stay and not be sent back to made into soap if he served. he did and became a citizen. I guess that Judge was a liberal commie Democrat.
Compare that service to Willard, his father and five sons,
Just saying..
June 16th, 2012
5:50 pm
Daperera
June 16th, 2012
2:57 pm: “Maybe we need immigration reform, but we certainly don’t need it by “executive order”. I called California’s Senator Boxer’s office and the staffer said that the President was “prioritizing” his enforcement of the law. I think this is called “selective” enforcement. I spent sometime looking through the US Constitution and could find nowhere any reference to “prioritizing” enforcement of the law, any law…..Bla, bla, bla…”
Two points you’re welcome to refute;
1) Obama has already deported more people back to Mexico than Bush did in 8 years.
2) Learn what a “signing statement” is. Explain why Bush used it more than all other US Presidents combined. Then find it written anywhere in the US Constitution.
saywhat?
June 16th, 2012
5:58 pm
I have figured it out. I re-read the U.S. Constitution, and no where did I read that governance should be competent and sensible. Our strict constructionist conservative brethren want nothing in government that isn’t in the Constitution, so maybe that explains their love affair with the previous occupant who must not be named.
Oh, wait. “Inept” and “worst President in US history” weren’t in the Constitution either. Conservatives certainly are complex creatures.
Toby3061
June 17th, 2012
1:18 pm
Wake me when November 6th gets here. Obama has dropped too many straws in this camel’s back…
Harry Turner
June 17th, 2012
1:29 pm
The author has no shame. This exercise of the Executive’s constitutional full plenary power over immigration law has exercised “prosecutorial discretion” in the best interests of keeping our country secure. He has deported 1 million illegals so far. Our President is winnowing the 1.2 million undocumented down the 800,000 keepers. They will be aspiring, motivated contributors to our country’s prosperity. Surely we have the confidence to let them help us with our most challenging problems.
Rick in Grayson
June 17th, 2012
4:17 pm
Harry…Harry! Where is the “prosecutorial discretion”? An ENTIRE class of illegal aliens is being allowed to stay in the US and they are being issued WORK PERMITS! This will surely affect the labor market for individual states which is not a “right” of the federal government.
LOL KYLE U MAD
June 17th, 2012
4:34 pm
Stop pretending that Conservatives have sympathy for these kids. They don’t. You don’t, Kyle.
And get over it, Obama check-mated you and you only have yourselves to blame, as evidenced by Romney’s inability to articulate any kind of immigration policy besides “self-deportation”.
This is good policy and good politics. Go ahead and see how far deporting innocent kids gets you.
rokidtoo
June 17th, 2012
9:12 pm
The President’s biggest mistake was trying to work with the Republicans. The Republicans (Congress and SCOTUS) want to defeat the President and they don’t care who or what gets hurt – the economy, the U.S. credit rating, public employees, or children. Therefore, the President’s response should be to fight them at every opportunity.
“That’s Not How Our Constitution is Written” — Academic VC
June 17th, 2012
11:50 pm
[...] case you don’t understand why I’m posting this now, please read what the President did last Friday.) Tweet Filed Under: Main, [...]
justiceserved
June 18th, 2012
12:33 pm
Bush used Executive Orders 291 times while President. Why was the right not up in arms then?
Intown
June 18th, 2012
1:08 pm
Obama is within his executive discretion to do this, right to make this a campaign issue, and right thumb his nose at Congressional conservative Republicans on this. We will never be able to achieve hermetic seal that Repubs demand as the prerequisite to any compromise. It is proof of their unwillingness to compromise. Moreover, there is no recognition on the Repub side of the historical and future importance of having robust immigration to fuel the forward progrss of this once and future robust nation. So, I say, keep it coming Obama. And pray that Romney and Co. don’t wise up before November so that no matter how much of Adelson’s money he spends, Latinos and those who remember their immigrant heritage put Obama in the White House for four more years.
Neil
June 18th, 2012
1:47 pm
Well done mein Furher! Law means nothing with you around.
Darwin
June 18th, 2012
4:35 pm
Please read South Baptist leader’s recent comments on this topic. Kyle – you’re even out of touch with your own base. But you do know how to stir the pot.
Victor Wilson
June 18th, 2012
9:47 pm
Why this editorial is wrong at best, ethnically prejudiced at best.
Wrong: 1. Most illegal immigrants come here on visas and overstay. “Border security” has little to do with it. 2. Immigration policy is economically unsound. At best it tries to keep out hard working first generation individuals ready to contribute much. At worst, it keeps out people that are needed. NOT ONE economic analysis indicates immigration is not a good idea. 3. It is a human issue. Breaking up settled families is worse than someone breaking the law to come here for a better future, AND the laws have been changed in the last 20 years to keep people from coming here. Legal immigration is now almost impossible. Why is it ethnically prejudiced? Most immigrants share this author’s values: Family orientation, anti-abortion, faith in God, and lack of faith in BIG GOVT. However, common ground on values is less important to this editorial’s author than common ethnicity. He shares more with “Bill the Butcher’s” Native Americans, than with anybody else. Fundamentally, his is the polite face of well articulated racial bigotry.
CFC
June 19th, 2012
11:32 am
Well done president.