Politics
Judge Halts Obama’s Immigration Action
President Barack Obama announces executive actions on immigration during a nationally televised address from the White House in Washington, Thursday, Nov. 20, 2014. (AP Photo/Jim Bourg, Pool)
(Politico) – President Barack Obama’s latest and boldest attempt to use his executive powers to grant quasi-legal status to illegal immigrants ran into a major road block late Monday as a federal judge in Texas barred the administration from going forward with plans for a major expansion of that drive.
The White House said early Tuesday that the Justice Department will appeal the decision handed down by U.S. District Court Judge Andrew Hanen.
Acting on a lawsuit brought by 26 states, Hanen ruled that Obama lacked authority to carry out much of the initiative he announced in November to allow up to five million more illegal immigrants to obtain work permits and reprieves from deportation.
Obama and his aides have argued that the new drive was legally justified as an exercise of prosecutorial discretion, since immigration authorities at the Department of Homeland Security lack the funding to deport more than a few percent of the 12 million people estimated to be in the U.S. illegally.
