On Friday’s “Special Report” on the Fox News Channel, syndicated columnist Charles Krauthammer said that the president’s shift on enforcing immigrations laws and granting certain privileges among illegal immigrants is “out-and-out lawlessness.”
Krauthammer told host Chris Wallace that this was a so-called “end-run” around the legislative branch of the federal government and explained how it defied the Constitution.
“Beyond the pandering, beyond the politics, beyond the process — is simple constitutional decency,” Krauthammer explained. “This is out-and-out lawlessness. You had a clip of the president himself say months ago ‘I cannot do this on my own because there are laws on the books.’ Well, I have news for president — the laws remain on the books. They haven’t changed.”
He said this appears to be the White House attempting to enact the DREAM Act, which failed to pass muster with the Congress after several attempts over the past several years.
“He proposed the DREAM Act of which the executive order is a variation,” Krauthammer continued. “He proposed a DREAM Act. The Congress said no. The Congress is the one who makes the laws. What the administration does is it administers law.”
“And in fact, what it is pretending to do is to use discretion,” he said. “That’s what the Homeland Security said. This is not discretion. Discretion is when you treat it on a one-by-one basis on the grounds of extenuating circumstances. That is declaration of a new set of criteria, which is essentially resurrecting the legislation that the Congress has said no to.” (VIDEO: Neil Munro explains his exchange with President Obama in Rose Garden)
Krauthammer reminded viewers of the criticisms the Bush administration took on when some perceived it to have been overstepping its bounds, while those same detractors have little to say about this.
“And I think this is not how you run a constitutional republic,” he continued. “This ought to be in the hands of Congress, and it is an end-run. And what’s ironic of course is for eight years, the Democrats have been screaming about the imperial presidency with the Bush administration — the nonsense about the unitary executive. This is out-and-out lawlessness. This is not how you govern. And I think that is the first issue that should be on the table.”
