House Speaker Paul Ryan is leading an effort on Capitol Hill to stop what he believes is an unlawful push by President Obama to expand benefits to illegal immigrants and protect them from deportation. Ryan, along with 233 of his colleagues, filed an amicus brief in United States. v. Texas, which is currently being debated in the Supreme Court.
Twenty-six states have signed on to the lawsuit against President Obama's executive amnesty. Ryan spoke for the plaintiffs this week, calling the president's plan a threat to Article 1 of the Constitution.
“I am asking the whole House to go on record as an institution,” Ryan said on the floor.
“If we’re going to maintain the principle of self-government, if we’re going to maintain this critical founding principle of government by consent of the governed, then the legislative branch needs to be writing our laws — not the executive branch, and certainly not a branch of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats,” the Speaker said.
Five Republicans broke ranks with their party and declined to support the resolution, including Reps. Carlos Curbelo (Fla.), Mario Díaz-Balart (Fla.), Bob Dold (Ill.), Richard Hanna (N.Y.) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (Fla.).
While Ryan has received criticism in the past for acting too lenient when it comes to amnesty, perhaps this hardline stance will convince conservatives he means business.
The Court is expected to make a decision by early summer, right as the presidential election is nearing its final, loudest stages.
In other words, this case won't have much of an impact or anything.