Here’s what’s planned on immigration by Republicans in the new Congress:
The House plans to vote next week on legislation that would defund President Obama’s executive action on immigration.
Republicans also plan to include language rolling back a 2012 order from the Obama administration that gave legal status to illegal immigrants brought to the United States as children.
The two measures would be considered as part of a bill funding the Department of Homeland Security through September. An earlier government-funding measure approved last month only funded that agency through February…
Mulvaney said Republicans debated in their closed-door meeting whether to focus solely on Obama’s move to shield illegal immigrants from deportation, or whether to attack the president’s policies on multiple fronts.
Some more moderate, swing-district Republicans “wanted the rifle shot, … maybe didn’t want to muddy the waters,” Mulvaney said. “But there were other voices in the room who said they wanted a chance to get at DACA, to get at the Morton memos” that relaxed some immigration laws in 2011.
Apparently the latter group won—for now.
However, there’s always the Senate:
Even if the funding bill passed in the House, it’s unclear whether Senate Republicans would be able to muster the 60 votes needed to overcome a likely Democratic filibuster.
And of course the White House:
The White House has repeatedly said President Obama wouldn’t sign a spending bill for DHS that undermines his executive actions, and Democrats quickly went on the attack.
The first step is Republican unity, and that seems to be in place. But it’s only the first step. Unfortunately, the Republicans don’t have the numbers to overcome a filibuster or a veto, so they need to either enlist enough Democrats to make a difference (good luck with that), or do something more “creative,” perhaps involving changes in the filibuster rule? Either way, they also must be prepared to have a showdown over a possible government shutdown.
The election of 2014 was merely the beginning of a fight that will be long and hard, and will require much intestinal fortitude on the part of Congressional Republicans. I have no idea whether they have the stomach for it, but I fear they don’t.
[Neo-neocon is a writer with degrees in law and family therapy, who blogs at neo-neocon.]
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Hey, this the the BIG LEAGUE now. Either you do what you were ELECTED to do or stay home. If you don’t change the Senate filibuster rule to 51 votes, then you are fools. Either take the fight to Obama or admit you are spineless go-along-to-get-along, lining your own pockets, elitists. The can is at the T intersection. FISH OR CUT BAIT!
Why do I get the feeling this is just smoke being blown up Conservatives’ collective a$$e$$? They fund Obamacare and take the department charged with national security hostage? I hope I am wrong but something tells me there is a big FAIL coming when Obama calls Boehner’s bluff and Boehner comes to the podium with tears in his eyes claiming he tried but in light of national security Congress is just going to have to fund DHS and unfortunately, immigration reform will have to be in there. But he will assure us he tried like the good conservative he is.
You get that feeling most likely because you are a realist. This is just window dressing. The house will pass a “tough” bill, the Senate will pass a “tough” but slightly different bill. They will take it to committee and strip out all of the enforcement and defunding language and then pass another squishy bill. Then Obama will tout how he is working with Republicans.
make him veto each and every bill – throw them at him daily. It will be obvious who’s doing the obstructing and it forces Democrat Senators and Reps to take a stance. That was Reid’s biggest usefulness, he made the difficult votes go away
Yup. I’d really like to see a series of Senate votes: it might remind everyone of what Senate Democrats stand for –> nothing. Dirty Harry Reid did the best he could to shield them.
A reminder to the Pubs: in the 2016 cycle, of the 34 Senators up for re-election, 24 are Pubs. If you’re hoping for our help you’d better start to deliver.
If the shotgun bill fails in the Senate, we at least get all the Democrats on record supporting Obama’s amnesty.
Then we come back with the rifle bill, narrowly targeting only the most recent (and broadest) executive actions, which very clearly infringe on Congress’ prerogatives. Again, the Democrats are on the record. Manchin will certainly desert, but that’s not enough to make 60 as Senate rules require. At least we have them on record.
With Democrats against and an Obama veto to back them up even if some vote with us, that is the most we can do.
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The morons who want to shut down the government, or HHS, have to realize at some point that it accomplishes nothing at all since the offices which will carry out the orders are funded by fees, not appropriations.
But the odds are they won’t, and will continue to screech like monkeys.
I’m fresh from just (two minutes ago) reading a piece from The Hill declaring the effort in jeopardy because Lindsey Graham, Peter King and some anonymous political aides said so, because.. terror! Paris! We must not jeopardize the agency that allows us to tuck our children in at night. Wish I could find reason for optimism, but I have sought to no avail.
“We must not jeopardize the agency that allows us to tuck our children in at night.”
Okay, I’ll buy that; let’s make sure we send Obama a bill of piecemeal DHS funding. Reallocate funds currently designated for the agencies/programs that would allow Obama’s “phone and pen” amnesty, to agencies that really do give the Homeland some Security, such as the Coast Guard.
Anyone who believes unfettered funding of DHS in line with Obama’s blanket amnesty would enhance our children’s security needs to remove their blinders, rosy glasses, and tinfoil hats! If we want to enhance our security the first obvious step is to admit, publicly, that Islamic Supremacists have declared war on everything we hold to be right and true; no more PC bull-pucks about how ‘radicals’ have ‘hi-jacked’ peaceful Islam!
I’ll call Lindsey and remind him that even if the department shuts down, NONE of the anti-terror and law enforcement functions will cease, as they are classified as “essential.”
As a blogger and write almost daily commentary, I usually don’t copy and paste other people’s columns. However, this is extremely important and wanted to facilitate this information to every American who is under the impression that King Obama’s directive to grant a form of amnesty is without cost. Up or down according to reports (if you can believe the lies emanating from government agencies) there are roughly 92 million American who are unemployed or part timers. In truth how can we afford to keep subsidizing foreigners who have broken the law, when we have our own families surviving on Obama’s welfare programs, yet who has relatively dismantled any real control over our borders or even internally with ICE. Do you even realize that thousands of American children go without food in the Appalachians areas of West Virginia?
The purpose of ConservativeHQ.com is to undo the damage caused by the Republicans who’ve betrayed the conservative cause. ConservativeHQ.com is the only Web site completely devoted to relaunching the conservative movement.
We already told you about Rep. Martha Roby’s (AL-2) attempt to lie her way past her vote for the “CRomnibus” with phony explanations about how the cheap labor wing of Capitol Hill Republicans will stop Obama’s unconstitutional “executive amnesty” by defunding it in the Department of Homeland Security appropriation bill due to be passed by the end of February 2015.
As we pointed out in our article “Gruber Republicans” the Department of Homeland Security is only a small part of the giant illegal amnesty machine Obama is deploying with House Republican leadership complicity.
After her vote for the CRomnibus, Roby was in full damage control-mode. In a column on the Yellowhammer Multimedia politics site Roby claimed that “The truth is the Appropriations plan does not ‘fund’ amnesty. It funds Homeland Security at the same levels as the alternative, full government Continuing Resolution would have. The only difference is we locked in full-year spending reforms in other aspects of the government and took the possibility of a government shutdown off the table for January.”
This is as bold a lie as a politician has told in a long time.
As anyone who read the bill would know, on pages 128 and 129 (Rules Committee version) the bill provides the Department of Justice (DOJ) funds for the “Administrative review and appeals (including transfer of funds) “For expenses necessary for the administration of pardon and clemency petitions and immigration-related activities, $351,072,000, of which $4,000,000 shall be derived by transfer from the Executive Office for Immigration Review fees deposited in the ‘Immigration Examinations Fee’ account.”
This directly provides $4 million to immediately process the paperwork necessary to implement amnesty for illegal aliens – and since it appropriates fees it also proves that House Appropriations Chairman Hal Rogers was just plain lying when he said that the House couldn’t do anything to stop amnesty since the money came from fee-based accounts.
Not only that, but on page 909 the bill grants millions of dollars to the Obama administration to educate and process the amnesty applications of the thousands of “UACs” or unaccompanied minor children that have flooded into the U.S. since Obama’s amnesty plan became common knowledge on the streets of Central America.
This shameful betrayal America’s workers and their families comes in the language on page 909 “regarding UACs: English Language Acquisition” where the bill appropriates three quarters of a billion dollars to educate immigrant children and youth and gives $14 million in special grants to states with at least one county that received 50 or more unaccompanied minors from the tsunami of amnesty seekers that washed up on our southern border earlier this year.
So Roby’s new bill, HR 31, “The Prevention of Executive Amnesty Act” would allegedly stop amnesty by blocking the Department of Homeland Security from funding the directives in Obama’s executive order.
Except no one has actually seen an Obama “executive order” on amnesty and the implementation of his policies allowing illegal immigrants to stay and work in the U.S. are being implemented throughout the federal government – not just the Department of Homeland Security.
What’s more there’s strong evidence that the Republican establishment’s Capitol Hill “leadership” has no intention of fighting executive amnesty beyond Obama’s expected veto of a bill like Roby’s HR 31.
Since the DoJ is not involved in immigration applications at all, whoever wrote that is an idiot.
Here’s a thought: pass and send to the White House a bill that says -> here are the current laws on immigration as passed by Congress . . . enforce them!
When Obama vetoes it, impeach his a$$.