Just a little while ago, on the Senate floor, Jeff Sessions rose to denounce President Obama’s plan to move forward with implementation of his illegal and unconstitutional amnesty plan. In ringing terms, Sessions called on Congress to act forcefully to block Obama’s usurpation. Here are some excerpts from his remarks:
Mr. Sessions: It’s already starting. There is being rented today a building in Crystal City, Virginia, to house the announced 1,000 workers that will be needed to be hired to process the unlawful executive amnesty that the president has said he intends to execute. The president is already moving forward, he is rushing to impose his immigration views before the Congress can contain or restrain it, before the American people fully understand what is happening, and make it so it can’t be stopped.His executive orders violate the laws of Congress, the laws that Congress has passed, in order to implement laws he wishes Congress had passed, but Congress has refused to pass. It refused in 2006, 2007, 2010, 2013, 2014. The American people through their Congressional representatives considered these kinds of proposals, they evaluated them, the American people expressed their views on them, and Congress said no. The people have been clear on this issue.
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Perhaps no other issue defines the gap between the elites in this country and middle Americans who go to work every day, who support our country, pay our taxes and fight our wars. Our people want our laws that are on the books now enforced. And if new laws are needed, they want us to pass new laws to end this lawlessness. But this president rejects the will of the people. His policies nullify the laws that we have, shockingly direct federal agents to ignore the law, ignore their oaths and not enforce it, creating this lawlessness that stains our legal system and our country today.
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But what I want to say to you is, colleagues, that the president has gone even further than that. He’s gone further than just saying I’m not going to enforce the laws, which he as president, the chief executive officer, is required to do, to execute the laws of the United States faithfully….But he’s moving forward with his immigration agenda, rejected by Congress and the American people. And he’s moving forward in a lot of different ways.
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So is Congress hopeless, helpless, ineffectual, is it unable to stop this? Absolutely not. Congress has the power to control what the president does. It has the power to control what he spends money on. The president, the executive branch, cannot spend one dime that has not been approved by the United States Congress… So Congress has a responsibility and a duty here. Congress should fund no program, should allow no presidential expenditure that is spent on programs it deems are unworthy. And it absolutely has a responsibility to ensure that this president spends no money to execute policies that are in violation of existing law.It has a constitutional duty, no matter what members may feel about the substance of the issue–and I have opinions on that. I opposed the president’s substantive position, but as a matter of law, separation of powers and constitutional duty–thunder and lightning!–this Congress should stop the expenditure of federal funds for projects that Congress has rejected….
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Colleagues, even Secretary Johnson, Secretary of Homeland Security, testifying a few days ago acknowledged that of these four, five million people who are going to be applying for legal status in America through the president’s program, there’s no way their applications are going to be evaluated. If they say they came to the country in 1999, nobody is going to check on that. They’re not going to see if they graduated from some school or had some job somewhere and investigate it. They’re simply going to act on the paperwork they’ve been given. And in many cases…there would not be any face to face meetings. You wouldn’t even go into an office and actually see the person. It would all be submitted by email and documents, which is highly risky, as the experts told us. You really need to see the person because it may not be the person they say they are.
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So, colleagues, the situation is graver than a lot of people think. … October 28 of this year, the citizenship officer, Mr. Kenneth Polenkis, the president of an association of 12,000 officers, this is what he issued in a statement: “We are still the world’s rubber stamp for entry into the United States, regardless of the ramifications of constant violations of the Immigration and Nationality Act. Whether it is the failure to uphold the public charge laws, the abuse of our asylum procedures, the admission of Islamic radicals or visas for health risk, the taxpayers are being fleeced and public safety endangered on a daily basis.” That’s what Mr. Polenkis said. Has anybody ever called him to testify and lay out these dangers? Certainly not in the United States Senate.President Obama, when he has his secret meetings with businesses and activist groups, they met all summer, people with their big money and their contributions. He met with them. Did he meet with Mr. Polenkis? No. Did he meet with the head of the I.C.E. Officers Association? No.
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Mr. Polenkis says: “I write today to warn the general public that this situation is going to get exponentially worse and even more dangerous. … News reports have leaked information to the public of a USCIS measurement contract bid for a surge of printing of 34 million green cards and employment authorization documents to be provided by foreign nationals, a bid that predicts the administration’s promise of executive amnesty.” He goes on to say, “That is why this statement is intended for the public….Immigration agencies are pleading for your help. Don’t let this happen. Express your concern to your Senators and Congressmen before it is too late.”
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“The attitude of USCIS management”–that’s the political appointees appointed by the president to execute his views of immigration–”is not that the agency serve the American public or the laws of the United States or public safety and nation security, but instead that the agency serves illegal aliens and the attorneys which represent them.”What a statement. Who is the government supposed to represent? We represent the people of the United States who are lawfully here.
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The president’s action will beget even more lawlessness in the future. It is a statement to the world, no matter what the law says, you come to America, you get to stay. You’ll not be deported. This is a recipe for disaster. It cannot work. What we need in this country, can achieve if Congress and the president will act, is to create a lawful system, enforce the law, to make it a system that we can be proud of, that’s fairly applied, a system that ends the ability of people to defraud our country and come in unlawfully and to serve the interests of working Americans.That’s what it’s all about. Are we serving their interests or are we listening to special interests, political groups and activist groups, politicians who think they gain political advantage and certain businesses who want more, cheaper labor? Don’t we represent the vast majority of the people? Isn’t there a national interest, an interest of the American people? Somebody needs to defend that interest. It’s been lost in this process.
It is obvious to anyone who has paid attention that there is somebody defending the interests of the American people, and his name is Jeff Sessions.
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