Time to listen to sound strategy, GOP!“The notion that this is simply prosecutorial discretion is simply nonsense. The Constitution gives Congress the authority to establish our immigration laws and what the president announced this week is a wholesale refusal to follow our immigration laws, to enforce our immigration laws. Number one, for 4 to 5 million people here illegally he is promising to print up and give work authorizations. Essentially, he’s gotten into the job of counterfeiting immigration papers because there is no legal authority to do what he is doing. He is simply giving work authorizations and claiming unilateral authority. But secondly, the memo that he put out — not the speech, the memo that he put out to the Department of Homeland Security — says that they are not to enforce immigration laws other than for violent criminals and a few discreet categories. For most of the 12 million people here illegally, the president is instructing the executive branch to no longer enforce the immigration laws. It is a stunning and sad display of a president declining to take care of his constitutional obligations and take that the laws be faithfully executed.”
NRO: Senator Ted Cruz (R., Texas) proposed a plan to stop President Obama’s administrative amnesty, the first step of which can only be taken by incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R., Ky.).There was the attempted stinger at the end by Wallace bringing up the government shutdown (remember, only 17%, folks; big whoop!), but Cruz quickly turned that around on him with the results of the midterm elections.
“Step number one that I have called for is the incoming majority leader should announce that if the president implements this lawless amnesty, that the Senate will not confirm any executive or judicial nominees, other than vital national security positions, for the next two years, unless and until the president ends this lawless amnesty,” Cruz told Chris Wallace on Fox News Sunday. “If the majority leader would announce that, it would impose real consequences on the president and the administration.” ...
“The second constitutional power we’ve got is the power of the purse,” Cruz continued. “And we should fund, one at a time, the critical priorities of the federal government, but also use the power of the purse to attach riders.”
By riders, Cruz is likely referring to an appropriations bill that would fund the Department of Homeland Security but stipulate that none of the funds appropriated may be used to implement Obama’s recent executive orders. And, following Cruz’s thinking, if Obama vetoes that bill next year, it wouldn’t result in a government-wide shutdown because Congress will have passed bills funding other parts of government.
Cruz’s plan is very similar to the one he hoped to execute during the fight to defund Obamacare, with one crucial difference: Republicans now control the Senate, so Harry Reid, in theory, can’t block the bills that would fund the rest of government.
“We’ve got to demonstrate that the campaign words Republicans used on the trail were more than just talk, that we’re willing to honor or commitment,” Cruz said.
Cruz also joined Fox & Friends this morning with much of the same discussion...
So...Take Two! No excuses this time to oppose your own guy, Mitch McConnell, John Cornyn and the rest of the GOP Senate leadership...you'll run the Senate come January, now act like it! This will all be on Obama.
Something tells me this will still be asking a lot from a hapless McConnell cabal, who generally think it's better to work with political opposition that's destroying the country for the sake of media headlines and campaign coffers, than, you know, to fight for the people who empowered them, not to mention securing the future stability of our republic.
Related links: Sen. Ted Cruz proposes new way to fight ‘Obama’s illegal amnesty’
Ted Cruz: The Senate must block all presidential nominees until Obama rescinds his amnesty
Video: SNL cold open rips Obama on immigration executive order
