With the rumors flying about the President taking executive action on the Immigration Reform issue in the near future, Republican conservatives are coming up with a plan to thwart his attempt to act. This plan is based on control of governmental spending and the Republican’s ability to block the president’s potential laws, but refusing to pass the budgetary necessities for the law to become reality. This potential block could delay the implementation of an immigration plan by cutting off the funding necessary to have the applications processed and the government identification cards issued.
In the Senate, Democratic leaders are trying to pass the spending bill in order to help and protect the millions of undocumented individuals who would be effected by the law and benefit from the relief of deportation or removal from the United States.
Republican Party leaders are hoping to avoid a clash with the President on this issue, as they fear that a government shutdown, like the one that occurred last year, could be on the horizon.
Next month, on December 11th, a temporary spending measure is set to expire and unfortunately if Congress does not pass a new spending bill, it could lead to a partial federal government shutdown again.
More than fifty Republican lawmakers have signed a letter to the Chairman of the Appropriations Committee, Harold Rogers, asking that if a pending bill is passed, it would not contain any language that could help the President make an executive action on immigration.
Republican Senator Matt Salmon from Arizona, stated that this would be an ideal opportunity for the party to come together and strongly get the message across that if the President tries to circumvent Congress and put forward the immigration reform, it would be a mistake. The Senator threatened that if it happened, there would be no funding for his policy.
The President’s promise to move forward with an immigration reform, in spite of the objection of a largely Republican Congress, is a great cause of dissention between the White House and Congress currently.
According to Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn from Tennessee, several members of the Senate have contacted her and asked how they can keep the President’s immigration reform from passing, by refusing to fund the project. The Senator stated that she feels that this might be a possibility.
Newly elected Majority Leader, Mitch McConnell, the Republican Senator from Kentucky warned that it would be a grave mistake for the President to act on immigration reform at this time. However, Senator McConnell promised that there would not be another government shutdown.
Republican leaders have promised not that the shutdown that occurred when a similar spending bill was used to attempt to defund the President’s health care initiative. The Republican Party’s reputation suffered from the federal shutdown and they are reluctant to let this same thing happen again, especially in light of the 2016 Presidential Election less than two years away. The Republican Party’s goal at this point is to appear favorable in the eyes of the national voters.