House Passes Bill Defunding Obama’s Amnesty for Illegals

Conn Carroll reports for Townhall that yesterday, Jan. 14, 2015, the GOP-dominated House of Representatives passed a Department of Homeland Security spending bill that effectively defunds Obama’s November 2014 executive amnesty program.

Rep. Raul Labrador (R-Idaho)

Rep. Raúl Labrador (R-ID) said after the vote, “The House defended its constitutional authority to make the law of the land in today’s vote to oppose President Obama’s unconstitutional executive actions on immigration. I am hopeful the Senate will do its job and reassert the duty of Congress to make immigration law.”

Rep. Rob Aderholt (R-Alabama)

An amendment offered by Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-AL) forbidding DHS from spending any money implementing Obama’s Deferred Action for Parental Accountability (DAPA) program passed 237 to 190. The amendment specified that the spending restrictions applied to fees collected by the agency and applied to four other memos written prior to November 20.

The Aderholt amendment did not, however, touch Obama’s June 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. A group of conservative members, led by Rep. Mick Mulvaney (R-SC), struck a deal with Aderholt not to include the DACA program in his amendment. These conservatives felt that including DACA would be a distraction from DAPA and would make it easier for Democrats to attack Republicans for wanting to deport children.

Note: What the Obama administration and the MSM call “children” include strapping teens who are criminals and gang members. Please see Trail Dust’s post “We need to re-define the term ‘minors’”.

Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN)

A separate amendment, offered by Rep. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN), did defund Obama’s DACA program. It too passed, but by a substantial smaller 218 to 209 margin.

Neither of these amendments would actually lead to any new deportations, but they would stop the United States Citizenship and Immigration Services office from giving work permits to illegal immigrants.

Pew Research Center estimates that DAPA would legalize 3.9 million illegal immigrants while 1.5 million are eligible for DACA, which means if Obama has his way, amnesty would be given 5.5 million illegal aliens.

Now the funding measure will move to the Senate where it faces an uncertain future. Republicans do have a 54-46 majority in the Senate, but Sens. Joe Manchin (D-WV), Jon Tester (D-MT), Heidi Heitkamp (D-ND), Angus King (I-ME), and Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) have all come out against the Aderholt amendment. It is not clear how Republicans can get to the 60 votes necessary to overcome a Democratic filibuster.

If they don’t Senate Republican leaders may try to narrow the defunding provisions to win over Democratic votes.

But even if they do, the POS in the White House has already said he will veto any bill that defunds his amnesty.