Greg Abbott: Obama Has ‘No Legal Authority’ to Grant Rights to Illegals

HOUSTON, Texas — The governor-elect of Texas, Attorney General Greg Abbott, claimed that President Obama has “no legal authority to grant legal status to people who are here in the United States illegally.”

Obama is expected to announce an executive order that will give millions of illegal immigrants a deportation reprieve through “deferred action.” During a Wednesday evening appearance on Fox News’ The O’Reilly Factor, Abbott said that such an action would be a “hoax on the people he is offering it to, because he doesn’t have the legal authority to grant them any rights whatsoever. To grant them rights requires official legal action, either by an administrative agency or by Congress.”

Abbott said that he will immediately challenge Obama in federal court, on behalf of the State of Texas, “as soon as possible” following the singing of an executive order on immigration.  

“We are prepared to assert legal action against the president because we believe that what the president is doing is completely unconstitutional,” the governor-elect said. “He has a legal obligation to enforce the laws. Plus immigration is assigned by the Constitution to the United States Congress to determine, not the president.”

Abbott said that Texas will invite other states to challenge the president as well. But because Texas has been forced to deal with the many consequences of an open border, the state is prepared to challenge the president alone. 

“Because Texas was at the epicenter last time, because Texas will be one of the leading states suffering the consequences of this action, we believe we have sufficient standing alone,” Abbott said.

He added that granting deferred action could ultimately result in death. Referring to the border crisis that took place over the summer — which included tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors from Central America entering the U.S. — Abbott said,  “Understand this: many of those children never made it here because they were killed along the way. Other children were tortured, others were raped. The United States, and the president, would be an accomplice to the inhumane way that people would be treated who come here because of the order.”

He concluded, “Any country that has lived by a dictator fiat methodology has wound up in chaos.”

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