The only question now is how to fight the Emperor’s amnesty plan—Obama implied on Feb. 14, 2013, that only an “emperor” could do executive amnesty.
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Texas Senator Ted Cruz has recommended two good options for the Senate.
The first is to put Obama on notice that none of his appointees will be approved by the Senate for the next two years, with the exception of those related to national security. The second is to pass the 12 appropriations bills that fund various parts of the federal government separately and send them on to the president, which is how the process used to work. Only Cruz suggested prioritizing them so the most important ones can be signed and defund some of Obama’s efforts in the less important appropriations bills.
Can Congress challenge the Emperor legally? Perhaps, but it hasn’t been very good at it. The lawsuit approved by the House, which targets a provision in Obamacare, apparently has gone nowhere.
Enter the states. They should immediately file suit challenging the Emperor’s power grab.
The states will clearly have standing to sue. Obama’s action will impose a significant financial burden on them. State and local governments already have to provide various services such as free public education, fire and police protection, and at least emergency medical care. De facto legalization for millions of illegal immigrants will impose even more costs.
More importantly, Obama’s actions will send a message to millions of foreigners that the immigration doors are wide open—just as immigrant children flooded the borders earlier this year. Even if he claims that he is not going to help newcomers, any reasonable person could assume that Emperor changed his mind once, he could change it again.
Ironically, Obama’s open-door policy comes at a time when the Pew Research Center says the illegal immigrant population has stabilized at 11.2 million. And Pew says that the Mexican illegal immigrant population is at its lowest level since 1995. Most of the new immigrants are from Central America—just like that influx of children.
Those entering to get a piece of the amnesty will impose significant costs on states, which means they have standing to sue. Texas Governor Rick Perry has already indicated that Texas will likely sue, and many other states will surely do the same.
Of course, that process can be slow. States will sue in federal courts and a judge has to hear the case and render a decision. The case would likely be appealed to the appropriate federal appeals courts, which will also render a decision.
If two or more appellate courts disagree, the plaintiffs will appeal to the Supreme Court. Or at least that’s the normal process. The plaintiffs—i.e., states, though some businesses might sue also—will push for the Supreme Court to hear the case as early as possible, arguing that the issue is too important to go through a years-long process.
And there is reason to think the liberals on the Court won’t reflexively approve Obama’s amnesty. In June, the Court ruled unanimously that Obama violated the Constitution when on January 4, 2012, he decided he could determine when the Senate was in recess and made three recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board.
Finally, suing the Obama administration over the Emperor’s amnesty will be good practice for what is likely to be many more lawsuits in the near future. Obama intends to unleash the regulatory mad dogs at the Environmental Protection Agency, and several state attorneys general—e.g., Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt—have indicated they will fight that unconstitutional regulatory overreach.
The U.S. has a federalist system, and it was the states that created the federal government, not the other way around. They have been reasserting their constitutionally protected independence and rights in the past few years, and with the growth of Republican governors and state legislatures that trend will continue.
States may be our last, best chance at stopping Obama—and that’s a good thing. Someone has to cry out, “But the Emperor has no clothes!”