Category Archives: Drug Cartels

Behind Obama’s Executive Order on Immigration

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Some key items are coming to the surface with regard to the executive order on immigration. Preferential treatment of chosen classes and conditions are targets of the White House while others are going to pay monetarily.

But off script, Obama admitted this past week that he DID change the law on immigration.

Fast forward to Tuesday, when Obama was speaking on immigration reform to a group in Chicago. When protesters began yelling at Obama to stop all deportations, the president became frustrated and answered: “There have been significant numbers of deportations. That’s true. But what you’re not paying attention to is the fact that I just took action to change the law.”

 

Rather than employing U.S. citizens that already have high tech skills and work history or rather than training U.S. citizens for employment in the technology sector, the White House has chosen foreigners to first priority.

Opportunities for Tech Workers, Firms in Obama’s Immigration Order

With Washington and much of the country abuzz about the politics and legality of President Barack Obama‘s executive order on immigration, it is useful to recognize the economic benefits of certain overlooked features of that order–things that, to a modest degree, enhance work opportunities for skilled immigrants.

For example, as immigration expert Vivek Wadhwa has highlighted, the president’s order makes the temporary (six-year) H-1B visa for technical workers portable.

H-1B visas, currently capped at 65,000 per year, are loved by the tech industry, and why not? They give employers market power over visa holders. Making it easier for these skilled immigrants to move to other employers benefits not only them but potentially many new or young companies in need of tech talent. While “coding academies” are springing up around the U.S. to train Americans of all ages on software coding, the tech market could still use a lot more talent, even if some of it comes from abroad.

The president’s order also could allow as many as 10,000 additional immigrant entrepreneurs to remain in the U.S. This step is significant in light of evidence compiled by Mr. Wadwha and his research colleagues that immigrants punch well above their weight in forming successful tech companies: They accounted for 25% of successful tech enterprises from 1995 to 2005, almost double the share of the U.S. population born elsewhere (13%). These successful immigrant-founded companies generate jobs for native-born Americans and are clearly a win for the U.S. economy.  Read more here.

But it gets worse. There is a money component, and collusion enters the White House plan.
Hiring Illegal Immigrants Will Earn Businesses $3,000 Per Employee Under President’s Plan 

Hiring illegal immigrants used to come with a hefty punishment if a business owner was found out, but now under President Obama’s plan announced through executive action last week, job creators will be rewarded.

The president’s call to offer undocumented workers a path to citizenship will come with a $3,000 per employee financial incentive to any business that wants to hire these workers.

Fox News points out that because of a “kink” in the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare), “businesses will not face a penalty for not providing illegal immigrants health care.” Furthermore, these workers will not be eligible for public benefits “such as buying insurance on ObamaCare’s health exchanges.”

“If it is true that the president’s actions give employers a $3,000 incentive to hire those who came here illegally, he has added insult to injury,” Rep. Lamar Smith, a Texas Republican, commented to The Washington Times. “The president’s actions would have just moved those who came here illegally to the front of the line, ahead of unemployed and underemployed Americans.”

President Obama doesn’t believe that bringing undocumented workers into the workforce is a bad thing, as he stated in recent comments on the executive action.

“Immigrants are good for the economy. We keep on hearing that they’re bad, but a report by my Council of Economic Advisers put out last week shows how the actions we’re taking will grow our economy for everybody,” he said.

John Husing, chief economist for the Inland Empire Economic Partnership in California, one of the most immigrant-heavy states in the nation, agreed that President Obama’s plan was a good thing in comments to the Pasadena Star News.

“Most of those people are probably already working anyway,” Husing said. “And when you talk to any demographer they will tell you that one of the biggest problems we have as a society is that our labor force is getting very old. Most of the undocumented people who are here tend to be younger and they would add to the available workforce in the age group that employers need.”

In the same publication, California Republican assemblyman Tim Donnelly disagreed.

“If you introduce 5 million individuals into the labor force — and I think that’s a really low figure — it will have a dramatic impact on those who are already seeking work…. It will especially have an effect on people who are working at lower income levels where any change in the labor market has the effect of lowering wages. This could depress wages. That’s a real concern.”

What do you think about giving employers financial incentives to hire illegal immigrants — good move, or will it depress the job hunt for native workers?

 

 

 

Prisons, Cells for Terrorism

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On March 10, 2003, Senator Charles Schumer wrote a letter to the OIG requesting that we examine the BOP’s process for selecting Muslim chaplains based on concerns that the BOP relies solely on two Islamic groups to endorse its Muslim chaplains, the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA) and the Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences (GSISS). Schumer noted that the ISNA and the GSISS allegedly are connected to terrorism and promote Wahhabism, which some consider an exclusionary and extreme form of Islam. In addition to Senator Schumer, Senators Jon Kyl and Dianne Feinstein expressed similar concerns and asked the OIG to examine these issues as they relate to the BOP.

OIG interviewed the BOP’s ten Muslim chaplains, the BOP detailee to the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s (FBI) National Joint Terrorism Task Force (NJTTF), and officials at BOP Headquarters who are responsible for religious services providers, including the Chief of the Chaplaincy Services Branch and the Senior Deputy Assistant Director (SDAD) of the Correctional Programs Division. We also interviewed FBI counterterrorism officials and representatives of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom at the U.S. Department of State (Commission).  Read more here.

Years later, prisons are in fact terror cells and no solution is in sight.

U.S. Prisons Churning Out Thousands Of Radicalized Inmates

Joy Brighton published a profound piece.

Back in 2006, then FBI director Robert Mueller prophetically described the radical Islamist conversion machine operating throughout U.S. prisons, to a Senate committee. He said that prisons were a “fertile ground” for Islamic extremists, and that they targeted inmates for introduction to the militant Wahhabi and Salafist strains of Islam.

The recent so-called “lone wolf” terrorist attacks in Oklahoma City, New York, and just over our northern border in the Canadian capital of Ottawa, may be the product of such radicalization.

In April 2010, Larry James murdered his mother, pregnant wife, 7-month-old son, 3-year-old niece and 16-year-old niece for refusing to convert to Islam. James converted in 2007, while in a U.S. prison.

Then two months ago Colleen Hufford, a 54-year-old grandmother and factory worker in Oklahoma, was beheaded with a produce knife by Alton Nolen who likely converted to Islam in a U.S. prison. Nolen is being charged with workplace violence.

Last month NYPD officer Kenneth Healey, 25, was axed to death with a hatchet to the side of the head. He was not attacked by a “lone wolf,” but by ex-con Zale Thompson. New York City Police Commissioner William Bratton has called it a terrorist attack, and the NYPD might want to look at Thompson’s record in California where he did two brief terms in California prisons.

The statistics are staggering, and woefully out of date. One out of three African-American inmates in U.S. prisons convert to Islam while incarcerated.

This statistic is no longer limited to African-Americans in prison. The Huffington Post reported an estimated 35,000 – 40,000 inmates convert to Islam each year, and that 15 percent of the total U.S. prison population or 350,000 inmates are Muslim.

This is more than 18 times the national representation of Muslims in America, reported to be 0.8 percent. Prisons are churning out converts to Islam who are taught they are righteously entitled to control the religion, speech, and dress of family, co-workers and strangers.

The key to conversion success is clear. Our government has been contracting and paying Muslim Brotherhood front groups, such as GSISS (The Graduate School of Islamic and Social Sciences) and ISNA (Islamic Society of North America) to screen and assign Muslim prison chaplains for at least 8 years.

While Egypt and Saudi Arabia have banned the Muslim Brotherhood, classifying it as a terror group, the White House, U.S. prisons, and the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security continue to work with Muslim Brotherhood groups.

For example, Paul Pitts served 14 years in prison for murder, where he converted to Islam and became Imam Abdu-Shahid. He was paroled in 2001 and hired as a prison chaplain in 2007 with an annual salary of $49,471. In Feb 2010, he was caught trying to bring scissors and razor blades into the Manhattan Detention Complex.

A New York City corrections department source told the New York Post: “It’s a disgrace that taxpayers are funding Muslim chaplains who not only have criminal records, but also are promoting violence.”

Abdu-Shahid’s boss – head chaplain Umar Abdul-Jalil – was hired at an annual salary of $76, 602 even though he served 14 years for dealing drugs. In 2006, he was suspended for two weeks without pay after declaring that “the greatest terrorists in the world occupy the White House.” He continues to oversee 40 prison chaplains.

According to the Wall Street Journal, Wallace Gene Marks converted under Imam Umar while in prison for weapon possession. He was hired as a one of the first paid Muslim chaplains in 1975 and has hired nearly 45 chaplains. Imam Umar says that prison “is the perfect recruitment and training grounds for radicalism and the Islamic religion” and that 9/11 hijackers should be honored as martyrs. “Funded by the Saudi government he traveled often to Saudi Arabia and brought that country’s harsh form of Islam to New York’s expanding ranks of Muslim prisoners.”

Just after 9/11, Aminah Akbar, a veteran female Muslim chaplain, told a crowd of 100 inmates at the Albion Correctional Facility for women that Osama bin Laden “is a soldier of Allah,” and added, “I am not an American, and I just live here.”

A New York City Corrections source told the  New York Post: ”It’s a disgrace that taxpayers are funding Muslim chaplains who not only have criminal records, but also are promoting violence. “Ignoring these red flags under the aegis of political correctness is literally killing us.”

​We must demand that the religion of Islam be separated from the totalitarian politics of Sharia-ism. Sharia-ism, like Soviet Communism and Nazism is bent on global control by silencing criticism and working within an unsuspecting political system to eventually overthrow it. Our taxpayer funded prisons have been co-opted by the leaders of Sharia-ism in America, the Muslim Brotherhood. More silence will likely mean the death of more innocent Americans.

Joy Brighton is author of Sharia-ism is Here: The Battle to Control Women and Everyone Else.

 

Amnesty Speech Full of Lies

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If you think that Barack Obama is governing the United States in the best interest of the nation you would be wrong. If you think he is leading, you would be wrong. Barack Obama reacts to only pressure from special interest and none was more poignant that the 15 minute speech he gave on November 15, 2014. This speech not only was full of distortions and omissions but was driven by several factors including powerbrokers speaking on behalf of illegals. If there is any question about how the speech came to be that Obama delivered last night, then click here for who was behind the event.

The law of unintended consequences are still to be determined. Just one consequence of Obama’s action goes back to Jonathan Gruber. He has been fast at work for years giving opaque points on Obamacare, but here is how illegals will be part of the healthcare system on your tax dollars.

Now for the speech, even the Associated Press delivered the Pinocchio report.

FACT CHECK: Obama’s claims on illegal immigration

By ALICIA A. CALDWELL and ERICA WERNER
Associated PressWASHINGTON (AP) – President Barack Obama made some notable omissions Thursday night in his remarks about the unilateral actions he’s taking on immigration.

A look at his statements and how they compare with the facts:

OBAMA: “It does not grant citizenship, or the right to stay here permanently, or offer the same benefits that citizens receive – only Congress can do that. All we’re saying is we’re not going to deport you.”

THE FACTS: He’s saying, and doing, more than that. The changes also will make those covered eligible for work permits, allowing them to be employed in the country legally and compete with citizens and legal residents for better-paying jobs.

___

OBAMA: “Although this summer, there was a brief spike in unaccompanied children being apprehended at our border, the number of such children is now actually lower than it’s been in nearly two years.”

THE FACTS: The numbers certainly surged this year, but it was more than a “brief spike.” The number of unaccompanied children apprehended at the border has been on the rise since the 2011 budget year. That year about 16,000 children were found crossing the border alone. In 2012, the Border Patrol reported more than 24,000 children, followed by more than 38,800 in 2013. In the last budget year, more than 68,361 children were apprehended.

___

OBAMA: “Overall, the number of people trying to cross our border illegally is at its lowest level since the 1970s. Those are the facts.”

THE FACTS: Indeed, in the 2014 budget year the Border Patrol made 486,651 arrests of border crossers, among the fewest since the early 1970s. But border arrests have been on the rise since 2011.

The decline in crossings is not purely, or perhaps even primarily, due to the Obama administration. The deep economic recession early in his presidency and the shaky aftermath made the U.S. a less attractive place to come for work. The increase in arrests since 2011 also can be traced in part to the economy – as the recovery improved, more people came in search of opportunity.

___

OBAMA: “When I took office, I committed to fixing this broken immigration system. And I began by doing what I could to secure our borders.”

THE FACTS: He overlooked the fact that he promised as a candidate for president in 2008 to have an immigration bill during his first year in office and move forward on it quickly. He never kept that promise to the Latino community.

___

Associated Press writers Calvin Woodward and Jim Kuhnhenn contributed to this report.

EDITOR’S NOTE _ An occasional look at political claims that take shortcuts with the facts or don’t tell the full story.

Then the Wall Street Journal delivered their summary of the immigration speech. Obama centered the speech and actions only around himself.

I, Barack

The immigration order is an abuse of power that fails as a policy reform.

President Obama ’s decision to legalize millions of undocumented immigrants by his own decree is a sorry day for America’s republic. We say that even though we agree with the cause of immigration reform. But process matters to self-government—sometimes it is the only barrier to tyranny—and Mr. Obama’s policy by executive order is tearing at the fabric of national consent.

The first question to address is Mr. Obama’s legal rationale. At least he finally rolled out a memo from the experts on presidential power in the Justice Department Office of Legal Counsel, but it’s fair to wonder how much time he gave them. The OLC made its justification public about an hour before the speech.

The President’s rationale is “prosecutorial discretion,” but he is stretching that legal concept beyond normal understanding. The executive branch does have discretion about whom to prosecute. But this typically extends to individual cases, or to setting priorities due to limited resources such as prosecuting cocaine but not marijuana use.

Mr. Obama claims he is using his discretion to focus on such high deportation priorities as criminals, but he is going much further and is issuing an order exempting from deportation entire classes of people—as many as five million. Justice’s OLC memo claims there is no such categorical exemption, and that immigration officials can still deport someone if they want to, but the memo offers no measures by which to make that “complex judgment.” In practice it will almost never happen.

The Reagan and Bush precedents cited by the Obama lawyers are different in kind and degree. They involved far fewer people and they were intended to fulfill the policy set by Congress—not, as Mr. Obama intends, to defy Congress. That is why their actions were done with little controversy.

Mr. Obama is issuing his order amid furious political opposition and after his own multiple previous declarations that he lacks legal authority. “If we start broadening that [his 2012 order for undocumented children], then essentially I’ll be ignoring the law in a way that I think would be very difficult to defend legally,” Mr. Obama said on Telemundo in September 2013. Until now.

While we favor generous immigration, Mr. Obama’s order also fails as policy because it won’t reduce the economic incentive that drives illegal immigration. The only way to reduce the flow of illegal migrants is to offer enough legal ways to work in the U.S. and then return home.

His unilateral order will encourage more migrants to come in hope of a future amnesty, without matching the ebb and flow of migration to America’s changing labor market demands. His order also offers no prospect of future citizenship, creating a laboring class with less of a stake in American institutions—and less incentive to assimilate.

The politics of immigration is already fraught, and Mr. Obama’s order will make it worse. He is empowering the most extreme anti-immigrant voices on the Republican right, which may be part of his political calculation.

Mr. Obama wants Democrats to get political credit with Hispanics for legalization, while goading the GOP into again becoming the deportation party in 2016. Hillary Clinton would love that, which explains why Bill Clinton is already backing Mr. Obama’s order. Mark this down as one more way in which this President has become the Great Polarizer.

How should Republicans respond? They can use their own constitutional powers without falling into Mr. Obama’s political trap. Impeachment is a fool’s errand that would change the political subject and fail. The power of the purse is an obvious tool now that the GOP will soon control the Senate, but that will require patience and unity to prevail over Mr. Obama’s vetoes.

The best GOP revenge would be to trump him on immigration. Before Mr. Obama’s decree, smart Republicans were discussing a legislative strategy focusing on piecemeal immigration reforms. Separate bills addressing individual problems (border security, agriculture and tech visas) could pass with rotating majorities that show the GOP has immigration solutions of its own. Some bills might get to Mr. Obama’s desk, forcing him to reveal his cynical political hand if he uses his veto to block durable reform.

We realize this won’t be easy, especially as many on the anti-immigrant right will want an immediate strategy to defund the President’s order. But another Pickett’s charge up Shutdown Hill is exactly what Mr. Obama wants. Republicans need to keep the focus on Mr. Obama’s abuse of power while showing voters they have better immigration solutions.

***

The polls show the American people are uneasy about Mr. Obama’s unilateral law-making, and liberals should be too. Mr. Obama is setting a precedent that Republican Presidents could also use to overcome a Democratic majority. How about an order to the IRS not to collect capital-gains taxes on inflated gains from property held for more than a decade? That policy would be broadly popular and also address a basic lack of fairness.

Mr. Obama’s rule-by-regulation has already been rebuked more than once by the Supreme Court. His “I, Barack” immigration decree is another abuse that will roil American politics and erode public confidence in the basic precepts of self-government.

U.S. Constant State of Emergency

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From the White House on National Security:

Progress

Guiding Principles

The President’s highest priority is to keep the American people safe. He is committed to ensuring the United States is true to our values and ideals while also protecting the American people. The President is committed to securing the homeland against 21st century threats by preventing terrorist attacks and other threats against our homeland, preparing and planning for emergencies, and investing in strong response and recovery capabilities. We will help ensure that the Federal Government works with states and local governments, and the private sector as close partners in a national approach to prevention, mitigation, and response.

The National Security Strategy, released May 27, 2010, lays out a strategic approach for advancing American interests, including the security of the American people, a growing U.S. economy, support for our values, and an international order that can address 21st century challenges.

But the last time a National Security strategy was addressed in total was 2010.

Meanwhile, see below.

The United States is in a state of emergency – 30 of them, in fact

By Christopher Ingraham

The United States has been in an uninterrupted state of national emergency since 1979. Here in 2014, we’re not dealing with just one emergency – there are currently 30 of them in effect.

That’s according to data on presidential declarations of emergency compiled by Gregory Korte of USA Today. “Those emergencies, declared by the president by proclamation or executive order, give the president extraordinary powers — to seize property, call up the National Guard and hire and fire military officers at will,” Korte writes.

President Obama has declared nine so far, eight of which are currently in effect — they primarily deal with preventing business with people or organizations involved in global conflicts or the drug trade. Obama has also renewed many of his predecessors’ orders — just last week he renewed our ongoing state of emergency with respect to Iran for its 36th straight year.

Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush took a light touch on declarations of emergency – they invoked only a handful, none of which remain in effect. But Bill Clinton proclaimed 16 emergencies and George W. Bush declared 14, 13 of which are still in effect today.

Blocking business transactions with various interests may not seem like national emergency material. But the language underlying these declarations is often nearly apocalyptic. Obama’s recent continuation of a Bush-era emergency relating to “the property of certain persons contributing to the conflict” in the Democratic Republic of the Congo states that “this situation continues to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the foreign policy of the United States.”

The Obama administration also maintains that “the actions and policies of certain members of the Government of Belarus and other persons continue to pose an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security and foreign policy of the United States.”

You may wonder why the president needs to declare a state of emergency to deal with what appears to be fairly routine instances of corruption in far-flung corners of the world. Korte notes that Congress provides little oversight on emergency declarations, even through it’s mandated to do so by law. In an era when tussles over executive power are a near-daily occurrence, this is a strange incongruity.

“What the National Emergencies Act does is like a toggle switch, and when the president flips it, he gets new powers. It’s like a magic wand. and there are very few constraints about how he turns it on,” said Kim Lane Scheppele, a Princeton professor interviewed by Korte.

In the absence of a crisis, there’s little compelling reason for a government to adopt a permanent crisis stance. The danger is that a public desensitized to claims to extraordinary circumstances could be more likely to allow excesses of authority performed in the name of those circumstances.

As Korte writes, “A post-9/11 state of national emergency declared by President George W. Bush — and renewed six times by President Obama — forms the legal basis for much of the war on terror” — a war which has so far seen a rise in terrorism around the globe.

Amnesty/Deportation, Obama’s Scam

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22 Times President Obama Said He Couldn’t Ignore or Create His Own Immigration Law –

With the White House poised to grant executive amnesty any day now despite the American people’s staunch opposition, on Sunday President Obama was asked about the many, many statements he made in the past about his inability to unilaterally change or ignore immigration law. His response was astonishingly brazen: “Actually, my position hasn’t changed. When I was talking to the advocates, their interest was in me, through executive action, duplicating the legislation that was stalled in Congress.”

This is a flagrant untruth: “In fact, most of the questions that were posed to the president over the past several years were about the very thing that he is expected to announce within a matter of days,” reported The New York Times. “[T]he questions actually specifically addressed the sorts of actions that he is contemplating now,” The Washington Post’s Fact Checker agreed, awarding President Obama the rare “Upside-Down Pinocchio,” which signifies “a major-league flip-flop.” Even FactCheck.org piled on.

President Obama is once again trying to mislead Americans, but he can’t run from what he’s said over and over (and over) again. Not only are Americans not stupid – they can read:

  1. “I take the Constitution very seriously. The biggest problems that we’re facing right now have to do with [the president] trying to bring more and more power into the executive branch and not go through Congress at all. And that’s what I intend to reverse when I’m President of the United States of America.” (3/31/08)
  2. “We’ve got a government designed by the Founders so that there’d be checks and balances. You don’t want a president who’s too powerful or a Congress that’s too powerful or a court that’s too powerful. Everybody’s got their own role. Congress’s job is to pass legislation. The president can veto it or he can sign it. … I believe in the Constitution and I will obey the Constitution of the United States. We’re not going to use signing statements as a way of doing an end-run around Congress.” (5/19/08)
  3. “Comprehensive reform, that’s how we’re going to solve this problem. … Anybody who tells you it’s going to be easy or that I can wave a magic wand and make it happen hasn’t been paying attention to how this town works.” (5/5/10)
  4. “[T]here are those in the immigrants’ rights community who have argued passionately that we should simply provide those who are [here] illegally with legal status, or at least ignore the laws on the books and put an end to deportation until we have better laws. … I believe such an indiscriminate approach would be both unwise and unfair. It would suggest to those thinking about coming here illegally that there will be no repercussions for such a decision. And this could lead to a surge in more illegal immigration. And it would also ignore the millions of people around the world who are waiting in line to come here legally. Ultimately, our nation, like all nations, has the right and obligation to control its borders and set laws for residency and citizenship.  And no matter how decent they are, no matter their reasons, the 11 million who broke these laws should be held accountable.” (7/1/10)
  5. “I do have an obligation to make sure that I am following some of the rules. I can’t simply ignore laws that are out there. I’ve got to work to make sure that they are changed.” (10/14/10)
  6. “I am president, I am not king. I can’t do these things just by myself. We have a system of government that requires the Congress to work with the Executive Branch to make it happen. I’m committed to making it happen, but I’ve got to have some partners to do it. … The main thing we have to do to stop deportations is to change the laws. … [T]he most important thing that we can do is to change the law because the way the system works – again, I just want to repeat, I’m president, I’m not king. If Congress has laws on the books that says that people who are here who are not documented have to be deported, then I can exercise some flexibility in terms of where we deploy our resources, to focus on people who are really causing problems as a opposed to families who are just trying to work and support themselves. But there’s a limit to the discretion that I can show because I am obliged to execute the law. That’s what the Executive Branch means. I can’t just make the laws up by myself. So the most important thing that we can do is focus on changing the underlying laws.” (10/25/10)
  7. “America is a nation of laws, which means I, as the President, am obligated to enforce the law. I don’t have a choice about that. That’s part of my job. But I can advocate for changes in the law so that we have a country that is both respectful of the law but also continues to be a great nation of immigrants. … With respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive order, that’s just not the case, because there are laws on the books that Congress has passed …. [W]e’ve got three branches of government. Congress passes the law. The executive branch’s job is to enforce and implement those laws. And then the judiciary has to interpret the laws. There are enough laws on the books by Congress that are very clear in terms of how we have to enforce our immigration system that for me to simply through executive order ignore those congressional mandates would not conform with my appropriate role as President.” (3/28/11)
  8. “I can’t solve this problem by myself. … [W]e’re going to have to have bipartisan support in order to make it happen. … I can’t do it by myself. We’re going to have to change the laws in Congress, but I’m confident we can make it happen.” (4/20/11)
  9. “I know some here wish that I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself.  But that’s not how democracy works.  See, democracy is hard.  But it’s right. Changing our laws means doing the hard work of changing minds and changing votes, one by one.” (4/29/11)
  10. “Sometimes when I talk to immigration advocates, they wish I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself. But that’s not how a democracy works. What we really need to do is to keep up the fight to pass genuine, comprehensive reform. That is the ultimate solution to this problem. That’s what I’m committed to doing.” (5/10/11)
  11. “I swore an oath to uphold the laws on the books …. Now, I know some people want me to bypass Congress and change the laws on my own. Believe me, the idea of doing things on my own is very tempting. I promise you. Not just on immigration reform. But that’s not how our system works. That’s not how our democracy functions. That’s not how our Constitution is written.” (7/25/11)
  12. “So what we’ve tried to do is within the constraints of the laws on the books, we’ve tried to be as fair, humane, just as we can, recognizing, though, that the laws themselves need to be changed. … The most important thing for your viewers and listeners and readers to understand is that in order to change our laws, we’ve got to get it through the House of Representatives, which is currently controlled by Republicans, and we’ve got to get 60 votes in the Senate. … Administratively, we can’t ignore the law. … I just have to continue to say this notion that somehow I can just change the laws unilaterally is just not true.  We are doing everything we can administratively.  But the fact of the matter is there are laws on the books that I have to enforce.  And I think there’s been a great disservice done to the cause of getting the DREAM Act passed and getting comprehensive immigration passed by perpetrating the notion that somehow, by myself, I can go and do these things.  It’s just not true. … We live in a democracy.  You have to pass bills through the legislature, and then I can sign it.  And if all the attention is focused away from the legislative process, then that is going to lead to a constant dead-end. We have to recognize how the system works, and then apply pressure to those places where votes can be gotten and, ultimately, we can get this thing solved.” (9/28/11)

In June 2012, President Obama unilaterally granted deferred action for childhood arrivals (DACA), allowing “eligible individuals who do not present a risk to national security or public safety … to request temporary relief from deportation proceedings and apply for work authorization.” He then argued that he had already done everything he could legally do on his own:

  1. “Now, what I’ve always said is, as the head of the executive branch, there’s a limit to what I can do. Part of the reason that deportations went up was Congress put a whole lot of money into it, and when you have a lot of resources and a lot more agents involved, then there are going to be higher numbers. What we’ve said is, let’s make sure that you’re not misdirecting those resources. But we’re still going to, ultimately, have to change the laws in order to avoid some of the heartbreaking stories that you see coming up occasionally. And that’s why this continues to be a top priority of mine. … And we will continue to make sure that how we enforce is done as fairly and justly as possible. But until we have a law in place that provides a pathway for legalization and/or citizenship for the folks in question, we’re going to continue to be bound by the law. … And so part of the challenge as President is constantly saying, ‘what authorities do I have?’” (9/20/12)
  2. “We are a nation of immigrants. … But we’re also a nation of laws. So what I’ve said is, we need to fix a broken immigration system. And I’ve done everything that I can on my own[.]” (10/16/12)
  3. “I’m not a king. I am the head of the executive branch of government. I’m required to follow the law. And that’s what we’ve done. But what I’ve also said is, let’s make sure that we’re applying the law in a way that takes into account people’s humanity. That’s the reason that we moved forward on deferred action. Within the confines of the law we said, we have some discretion in terms of how we apply this law.” (1/30/13)
  4. “I’m not a king. You know, my job as the head of the executive branch ultimately is to carry out the law.  And, you know, when it comes to enforcement of our immigration laws, we’ve got some discretion. We can prioritize what we do. But we can’t simply ignore the law. When it comes to the dreamers, we were able to identify that group and say, ‘These folks are generally not a risk. They’re not involved in crime. … And so let’s prioritize our enforcement resources.’ But to sort through all the possible cases of everybody who might have a sympathetic story to tell is very difficult to do. This is why we need comprehensive immigration reform. To make sure that once and for all, in a way that is, you know, ratified by Congress, we can say that there is a pathway to citizenship for people who are staying out of trouble, who are trying to do the right thing, who’ve put down roots here. … My job is to carry out the law. And so Congress gives us a whole bunch of resources. They give us an order that we’ve got to go out there and enforce the laws that are on the books.  … If this was an issue that I could do unilaterally I would have done it a long time ago. … The way our system works is Congress has to pass legislation. I then get an opportunity to sign it and implement it.” (1/30/13)
  5. “This is something I’ve struggled with throughout my presidency. The problem is that I’m the president of the United States, I’m not the emperor of the United States. My job is to execute laws that are passed. And Congress right now has not changed what I consider to be a broken immigration system. And what that means is that we have certain obligations to enforce the laws that are in place even if we think that in many cases the results may be tragic.” (2/14/13)
  6. “I think that it is very important for us to recognize that the way to solve this problem has to be legislative. I can do some things and have done some things that make a difference in the lives of people by determining how our enforcement should focus. … And we’ve been able to provide help through deferred action for young people …. But this is a problem that needs to be fixed legislatively.” (7/16/13)
  7. “My job in the executive branch is supposed to be to carry out the laws that are passed. Congress has said ‘here is the law’ when it comes to those who are undocumented, and they’ve allocated a whole bunch of money for enforcement. And, what I have been able to do is to make a legal argument that I think is absolutely right, which is that given the resources that we have, we can’t do everything that Congress has asked us to do. What we can do is then carve out the DREAM Act folks, saying young people who have basically grown up here are Americans that we should welcome. … But if we start broadening that, then essentially I would be ignoring the law in a way that I think would be very difficult to defend legally. So that’s not an option. … What I’ve said is there is a there’s a path to get this done, and that’s through Congress.” (9/17/13)
  8. “[I]f, in fact, I could solve all these problems without passing laws in Congress, then I would do so. But we’re also a nation of laws. That’s part of our tradition. And so the easy way out is to try to yell and pretend like I can do something by violating our laws. And what I’m proposing is the harder path, which is to use our democratic processes to achieve the same goal that you want to achieve. … It is not simply a matter of us just saying we’re going to violate the law. That’s not our tradition. The great thing about this country is we have this wonderful process of democracy, and sometimes it is messy, and sometimes it is hard, but ultimately, justice and truth win out.” (11/25/13)
  9. “I am the Champion-in-Chief of comprehensive immigration reform. But what I’ve said in the past remains true, which is until Congress passes a new law, then I am constrained in terms of what I am able to do. What I’ve done is to use my prosecutorial discretion, because you can’t enforce the laws across the board for 11 or 12 million people, there aren’t the resources there.  What we’ve said is focus on folks who are engaged in criminal activity, focus on people who are engaged in gang activity. Do not focus on young people, who we’re calling DREAMers …. That already stretched my administrative capacity very far. But I was confident that that was the right thing to do. But at a certain point the reason that these deportations are taking place is, Congress said, ‘you have to enforce these laws.’ They fund the hiring of officials at the department that’s charged with enforcing.  And I cannot ignore those laws any more than I could ignore, you know, any of the other laws that are on the books. That’s why it’s so important for us to get comprehensive immigration reform done this year.” (3/6/14)
  10. “I think that I never have a green light [to push the limits of executive power].  I’m bound by the Constitution; I’m bound by separation of powers.  There are some things we can’t do. Congress has the power of the purse, for example. … Congress has to pass a budget and authorize spending. So I don’t have a green light. … My preference in all these instances is to work with Congress, because not only can Congress do more, but it’s going to be longer-lasting.” (8/6/14)

President Obama should listen to President Obama, drop his plan to “expand the authority of the executive branch into murky, uncharted territory,” and work with Congress rather than insisting on his stubborn, “my way or the highway” approach.

– See more at: http://www.speaker.gov/general/22-times-president-obama-said-he-couldn-t-ignore-or-create-his-own-immigration-law#sthash.E8n1WgmO.dpuf

**

November 20, 2014, at 8:00 PM, EST, Barack Obama is announcing his Emperor Immigration plan by abusing his authority.

Millions will be touched by his White House declaration being eligible for all entitlement programs regardless of what Congressman Gutierrez and Congresswoman Jackson Lee have to say on the matter.

The timing of this event which was released on Facebook is no accident. The White House is working diligently to change the media headlines fro Jonathan Gruber and Obamacare to something else where he once again assumes control of the media and his agenda. He knows full well that the mid-term elections spoke against his platform and administration, this is retribution.

Allowing Some Illegal Immigrants to Stay Abuses Prosecutorial Discretion

Elizabeth Price Foley

Elizabeth Price Foley is a professor of constitutional law at Florida International University College of Law and the author of “The Tea Party: Three Principles.”

November 18, 2014

In 2012, the Obama administration issued a policy exempting from deportation about 1 million young, illegal immigrants who came to the United States as children.

The president reportedly is considering an expansion of this policy, exempting an estimated 5 million to 6 million more illegal immigrants from deportation. The proffered legal justification is “prosecutorial discretion,” yet this label is immaterial.

Prosecutorial discretion allows an executive officer to decline prosecution on a case-by-case basis when there’s insufficient evidence or resources to do so. A U.S. attorney, for example, might prioritize prosecution of drug violations involving larger quantities, leaving smaller quantities to state prosecutors. Similarly, a U.S. attorney might decline to pursue charges when witnesses or other evidence aren’t strong.

But would it be prosecutorial discretion if the president instructed U.S. attorneys to prosecute only heroin cases, and ignore other drugs prohibited by federal law, such as cocaine, P.C.P. or methamphetamine? What if the president instructed U.S. attorneys not to prosecute any drug case where the arrestee was under age 31, had no felony convictions and was a high school graduate? Most people would think such acts — particularly the creation of entirely new categories of exemptions — would go well beyond prosecutorial discretion, constitute a rewriting of the law and violate the president’s constitutional duty to “take care that the laws be faithfully executed.”

There’s no logical stopping point to the prosecutorial justification underlying President Obama’s immigration policies. Presidents could simply decide not to enforce entire sections of the Clean Air Act, tax code or labor laws, or exempt entire categories of people — defined unilaterally by the president — on the assertion that those laws are “unfair” and there aren’t enough resources to go around. The president would have power to grant a “privilege” or exemption from any federal law, defying the plain language those laws and the will of the people’s Congress.

While several presidents — both Republican and Democrat — have used prosecutorial discretion to temporarily delay deportation in the face of wars (Nicaragua, Kuwait), hurricanes or earthquakes (El Salvador, Nicaragua, Honduras) and other discrete natural and political catastrophes, no other president has claimed the constitutional authority to ignore immigration law because he believes it’s unfair as a matter of permanent national policy.

At some point, the discretion not to prosecute a law becomes a failure to faithfully execute it. Whether President Obama’s immigration policies have crossed that line will be a matter for both courts and the American people to judge.