HOUSTON, Texas — Face the Nation host Bob Schieffer told President Obama Sunday that Republicans have told the President, “Don’t do it.” The issue: his taking executive action on amnesty. President Obama told Face the Nation viewers that he does not intend to wait for new House and Senate leadership to begin in January before he takes executive action. His statements come less than five days after voters rejected his immigration policies by rejecting Democrats at the voting booth. It also comes less than two days after congressional GOP leaders strongly urged the President to abandon his plan.
Schieffer noted that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) made statements to the effect of, “It’s like waiving a red flag before a bull.” Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) was similarly attributed with saying “When you play with matches, you take the risk of burning yourself.” McConnell is the presumptive incoming Senate Majority Leader, and Boehner is the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.
Schieffer asked the President “why not give them a chance to see what they can do on that and then take the executive order?”
The President responded he would sign legislation but until then, he was going to take executive action on “a parallel track.” He said any executive action could be superseded by legislation. “Nobody’s stopping ‘um” from enacting legislation, he said.
Obama told Schieffer he was “going to do what I can do through executive action” and continued “it’s not going to be everything that needs to get done and it will take time to put that in place.”
In a statement obtained by Breitbart Texas, U.S. Congressman Pete Sessions (R-TX-32) stated:
“Six years ago President Obama made a promise to the American people that he would successfully pass immigration reform. At the time he made this promise, his intent was to work through the legislative process and I believe it still should be. Since he has been in office, his policies have created more problems, false expectations, and have further weakened our immigration system. Now is the time for us to work together and for the President to work with the newly elected officials in both bodies of Congress to implement real solutions to reform our immigration system.”
Sessions stated “I am confident that Republicans in the House and the Senate will diligently work together to produce legislation that will strengthen and secure our border, create effective in-flow and exit protocols, ensure that all immigrants adhere and understand our code of law, and enforce a guest worker program to provide much needed and wanted workers.”
Senator John Cornyn (R-TX) issued a strong warning to the President after the meeting on Friday that voters sent a strong message on Election Day and he expected the President to work on immigration reform together, “beginning with border security and respect for the rule of law.” It is the Senator’s “hope that [the President] will reverse course and work with us – not around us – to secure the border and achieve real reforms to our immigration system.”
Congressman Ted Poe told Breitbart Texas, “On election day the American people made clear that they want a new direction in Washington. Yet, the president is still threatening to defiantly bypass Congress and ram through an executive order to grant amnesty to millions of foreign nationals. The president took an oath to follow the Constitution. The American people expect him to do so. America is a republic, not a monarchy.”
Speaker Boehner warned the President on Friday that executive action on amnesty would obliterate any opportunity for getting immigration reform by making it more difficult for Congress and the White House to work together where there might be common ground.
In June, Brandon Darby, Managing Director at Breitbart Texas, broke the story that led to media exposure on the plight of unaccompanied minors on the border. The President responded by vowing to take unilateral action on amnesty by the end of the year. Democrats have been at odds with the President over the issue. The President backed down in September before November elections.
Lana Shadwick is a contributing writer and legal analyst for Breitbart Texas. Follow her on Twitter @LanaShadwick2. Sarah Rumpf contributed to this story. Follow Sarah on Twitter @rumpfshaker.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.