Obama Is Determined to Bypass Congress on Immigration Issues

President Obama has learned nothing from the severe rebuke he just received from the US Supreme Court. He was found to be in violation of the Fourth Amendment's right to privacy, then in violation of the constitutional requirement for separation of powers, and finally in violation of religious rights protection guaranteed by the First Amendment. That is a dressing down for Mr. Obama, no matter how one tries to explain it. Reasonable people would ask : What has he learned and how will he adjust his relationship with Congress and with the American people. The answer he gave Monday is that he will change nothing. ~~~~~On the bitterly divisive question of immigration reform, President Obama says he will take executive action to reform the US immigration system after it became clear that legislation in Congress is officially dead for the rest of 2014. House Speaker John Boehner told Obama last week that the House would not vote on immigration reform this year, killing a wide-ranging bill passed by the Senate. The House opposes the Democrat-led Senate bill, which it says awards illegal immigrants with amnesty in a way that puts them on a path to citizenship. Further, Republicans believe the recent deluge of illegal immigrants from Central America, many of them unaccompanied children, is a direct result of the President’s immigration policies. When Republican House Speaker John Boehner said the immigration bill would not be taken up this year, he called the President's decision to use executive orders "sad" and "disappointing"  and warned that unilateral action would not solve the problem. Speaker Boehner explained : "In our conversation last week, I told the President what I have been telling him for months: the American people and their elected officials don't trust him to enforce the law as written. Until that changes, it is going to be difficult to make progress on this issue...It is sad and disappointing that - faced with this challenge - President Obama won't work with us, but is instead intent on going it alone with executive orders that can't and won't fix these problems." And many members of Congress in both parties have predicted that if legislation is not enacted this year, any new attempts would have to wait until 2017 after a new President takes office. And, Texas Republican Representative Lamar Smith is warning that Obama could face legal action if he goes too far on his own : “If the President insists on enacting amnesty by executive order, he will undoubtedly face a lawsuit and will find himself, once again, on the wrong side of the Constitution and the law.” The collapse of the legislative process delivers yet another blow to Obama's domestic policy agenda and comes as he struggles to deal with the flood of unaccompanied minors who have entered the United States from Mexico. It also sets up a new battle with congressional Republicans, who accuse Obama of going beyond his legal authority to take executive action to deliberately circumvent Congress. Obama blames House Republicans for refusing to bring immigration reform to a vote and agrees that legislation is needed to provide a permanent fix to the problem. "I take executive action only when we have a serious problem, a serious issue, and Congress chooses to do nothing. And in this situation, the failure of House Republicans to pass a darn bill is bad for our security; it's bad for our economy, and it's bad for our future," Obama said in the White House Rose Garden. "America cannot wait forever for them to act. That's why today I'm beginning a new effort to fix as much of our immigration system as I can on my own, without Congress." Obama directed Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson and Attorney General Eric Holder to move enforcement resources from the US interior to the border to promote public safety. He said he also asked his team to prepare recommendations on other actions he can take unilaterally by the end of the summer. But Boehner, in his statement, answered that Obama caused the border crisis by his haphazard immigration policies. "The President’s own executive orders have led directly to the humanitarian crisis along the southern border, by giving false hope to children and their families that if they enter the country illegally they will be allowed to stay." Boehner spokesman Michael Steele said the two leaders spoke in person about immigration reform last week. Obama has pushed for years for reform that would create a path to citizenship for the roughly 11 million undocumented immigrants within the United States. The US Senate bill had such provisions, but House Republicans largely opposed them, saying they grant amnesty and citizenship for people who entered America illegally. Obama's shift to executive action comes at a delicate time for the administration. The President sent a letter to Congress on Monday asking for an additional $2 billion to deal with the judicial and humanitarian crisis caused by the unaccompanied minors entering the US. Obama repeated on Monday that most of those children would be sent home. This crisis and the death of reform legislation puts Obama in the awkward position of studying new ways to help the undocumented workers who have been in the country for years - favored by the left of the Democrat Party - while getting tougher on juveniles who are entering now - opposed by the left. ~~~~~ So, Monday opened another chapter in the titanic test of wills between Obama and Boehner about the direction America should take. Townhall.com's Mary Katherine Ham told Bill O'Reilly on Fox News that Obama was following a familiar pattern : "He gives a speech, he asks for a list of things he can do on his own...He says he's going to act on his own. He then makes fun of Republicans in Congress and then asks them for a bunch of stuff. Some of Obama's ideas make sense, but he trashes the people he is asking to help him." Obama and Boehner have battled over healthcare, deficits, government spending and gun control, very seldom finding a compromise, something which will become even more difficult if, as expected, Republicans increase their majority in the House in the November mid-term elections and take control of the Senate. Boehner raised the stakes in the war with Obama about how the US should be governed and with what goals by announcing that he was considering a lawsuit charging the President with overstepping his constitutional boundaries with the series of executive actions he has pursued all year. And, given the end-of-session Supreme Court rulings that warned Obama about overreaching his constitutional powers as President, Obama must wonder how many of his executive actions - on issues such as energy, education, power plant carbon emissions and very likely an immigration amnesty - would survive a Supreme Court challenge. ~~~~~ Dear readers, the President is consistent and unrepentent : "So we take these actions, and now Republicans are mad at me for taking these actions. They’re not doing anything and then they’re mad at me for doing something. I’m not sure which of the things I’ve done they find most offensive, but they’ve decided they're going to sue me for doing my job," Obama said in a speech at Lake Harriet, Wisconson. Obama's actions have caused an uproar among Republicans. Boehner's spokesman, Michael Steel, rejected the President's criticism, saying : "The American people, their elected representatives, and the Supreme Court have all expressed serious concerns about the President’s failure to follow the Constitution." George Washington University law professor Jonathan Turley said : "The President of the United States can't say the solution to gridlock is you simply have to resolve it on my terms. There's a reason the issues aren't being resolved. Congress is divided because the public is divided in these areas." Turley, who agrees with many of Obama's policies, has warned of a constitutional crisis if Obama continues implementing those policies by bypassing Congress : "At some point this is going to cause serious problems for his administration. He's going to start to lose Democrats." We must ask what is driving Barack Obama to confront Congress, the Supreme Court and the American people? Not the polls, which show that only 40% of Americans believe he is doing a good job as President. One wonders if Barack Obama has simply cracked under the load of the American presidency. Here is one of his Wisconsin comments : "Sometimes I’m supposed to be, you know politic about how I say things, but I’m finding lately that I just want to say what’s on my mind. The Republican-controlled House...don't do anything except call me names." It gives us reason to worry about the President's mental state.