Thread: Sessions Praises House for Standing Strong, Warns Senate Democrats: You Will All 'Be

Sessions Praises House for Standing Strong, Warns Senate Democrats: You Will All 'Be Held to Account' on Amnesty

by Matthew Boyle 1 Aug 2014, 7:06 PM PDT
breitbart



Senate Budget Committee ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) praised House Republicans late Friday evening for standing strong on immigration and warned Democrats in Congress that they will be held accountable for supporting amnesty for illegal aliens.

“I applaud the hard work of House Republicans in putting together this package, and in particular would like to recognize the steadfast and unflinching efforts from members of our Alabama delegation,” Sessions said in a statement provided exclusively to Breitbart News. “The border bill has been substantially improved, and provides a marked contrast to the Senate Democrat bill—defeated on a bipartisan basis—that only perpetuated the crisis.”

Sessions’s praise comes after much turmoil in the House of Representatives over the past few weeks as Speaker John Boehner tried but failed to pass a supplemental appropriations bill on the border crisis that critics said didn’t address the root cause of the border crisis: President Barack Obama’s prior and planned executive amnesties. The House leadership pulled a bill late Thursday that critics like Sessions and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), as well as a core group of House conservatives, excoriated after Boehner and his new leadership team couldn’t get the votes to pass it. Afterwards, Boehner worked with members like Rep. Steve King (R-IA) and Michele Bachmann (R-MN) to improve the bill—fixing its flaws and focusing the package on stopping Obama’s planned executive amnesty. Then the House GOP conference coalesced around the new bill package and passed them both.

“Most importantly, the House has taken a firm vote today to block the President’s plan to provide unlawful executive amnesty and work permits to 5-6 million illegal immigrants,” Sessions said in his statement to Breitbart News. “They have again acted to protect U.S. workers. President Obama’s suspension of immigration law created this crisis and his new plan, if implemented, would escalate that crisis to an unimaginable degree.”

However, Sessions said, all Senate Democrats except for Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) have acted in favor of allowing Obama to continue with his executive amnesty. On Thursday, all Senate Republicans and Manchin voted for a Sessions motion that ended up killing the Senate Democrats’ supplemental appropriations bill on the border crisis, a vote Sessions framed as one that delineated members’ stances on the President’s planned executive amnesty.

“While the Republican House has voted to protect our constituents and our constitution, Senate Democrats have abandoned both in the face of this clear and present danger,” Sessions said. “Indeed, last night, all Senate Democrats except one voted to thwart the Republican effort to stop the President’s illegal actions. All but one Democrat voted with their Senate leader instead of the people who sent them here.”

Sessions added that the fight in the Senate is “only beginning” and called on Senate Democrats to join him, all Senate Republicans, and Manchin in opposing Obama’s planned executive amnesty—or be “held to account.”

“Now that the House has passed this measure to block the President’s unlawful actions, we will demand that every Senate Democrat be held to account,” Sessions said. “We will fight, and keep fighting, for its passage. I appeal tonight to all Americans: ask your Senator where they stand on President Obama’s executive amnesty. Ask them where they stand on protecting unemployed citizens from a plan which will give work permits and jobs to millions of illegal workers.”

Sessions concluded by highlighting the significance of the decision ahead for U.S. senators from both parties. “Senators face a time for choosing: to be complicit in the nullification of our laws, or to end this lawlessness and create an immigration policy we can be proud of,” Sessions said. “Mr. Reid: you and every single member of your conference will face this choice. On the defining issue of our nation’s laws and sovereignty, there is nowhere to hide.”

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Governm...unt-On-Amnesty

INSIDE SCOOP: Alabama delegation led conservative victory on immigration

• BY CLIFF SIMS
• — 1 AUG, 2014

In early July, President Obama asked Congress for a $3.7 billion emergency appropriation to deal with the tens of thousands of illegal immigrant children flooding into the United States. An estimated 57,000 Central American children have entered the country illegally over the past nine months, and many conservatives believe it was caused — at least in part — by President Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. DACA granted administrative ‘legal’ status and work authorization to many illegal immigrants, leading central Americans to flock across the border illegally in hopes of being granted amnesty through executive action.

Obama has been pressing Congress to grant him this blank check for the border. At the same time, his Administration has been advertising plans to expand their executive amnesty program to apply to another 5 plus million illegal immigrants.

Earlier this week, Republican leadership’s plan was to pass a $659 million spending bill, well short of the $3.7 billion Obama had requested, then get out of town for a five week recess. But their plan did not include a provision to block funding of any amnesty attempts by the executive branch.

Sen. Jeff Sessions promptly objected and penned a letter that was hand-delivered to all 535 members of Congress urging them to oppose the legislation unless it was updated to include such a provision.

“As you know, over the last five and a half years, the President has routinely bypassed Congress in order to suspend enforcement of our immigration laws,” Sessions wrote. “The most dramatic of these lawless directives was the President’s 2012 Deferred Action Program for Childhood Arrivals (DACA), in which the president implemented by executive fiat legislation that Congress has three times rejected.”
In a later statement, Sessions noted that the House legislation “fail(ed) to place effective restrictions on the President’s ability to grant unlawful amnesty and work permits… With great concern, we as policy makers must face the reality that the President is openly planning to use executive actions to provide amnesty and work permits to millions without any lawful authority. The Congress has a duty to resist. Legislation currently pending in both chambers… must be opposed.”

Sessions’ efforts led many of his conservative colleagues in Congress’s lower chamber to express concerns with the legislation as well. As the time to vote on the bill inched closer, GOP leaders realized they didn’t have the votes for passage and pulled the bill from the floor, a move that The Washington Post called “a sure sign of chaos.”

Chad Pergram ✔ @ChadPergram
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#BREAKING Source says Cruz influence didn't blowup border bill. It was Sen Sessions. "Sessions cost us the entire AL & MS delegations."
2:16 PM - 31 Jul 2014

Sources close to the House Majority Whip’s operation say they were only a few votes short, and the votes they were missing were from The Yellowhammer State.

“(House Speaker) Boehner and (Majority Leader) McCarthy were personally lobbying members of the Alabama delegation, but they wouldn’t budge,” a source on Capitol Hill told Yellowhammer on condition of anonymity so they could speak freely. “In particular, Aderholt, Brooks, Byrne and Rogers were pushing hard for tougher language. It was actually Aderholt’s tougher enforcement language that ended up in the final bill. He basically said, ‘I’m not voting for this unless my language gets in there.’ Several of the conservative heavyweights in the House backed what he was doing, too.”

It is widely believed that the efforts of Alabama’s Republicans were indispensable to blocking the initial flawed plan. They led the fight in the House.

The House ultimately voted on two separate bills Friday night.

The first was an updated immigration enforcement bill that conservatives say was greatly strengthened by the addition of Aderholt’s language. The second blocked executive action on immigration, a bill that wouldn’t even exist had Alabama’s delegation not pushed for it.

But as Fox News congressional reporter Chad Pergram pointed out on Twitter, not all of Alabama’s Republican delegation was on board with the Sessions-led plan.

Chad Pergram ✔ @ChadPergram
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Tape: Spencer Bachus (R-AL): "I have great respect for Sen Sessions, but he doesn't tell me how to vote."
3:23 PM - 31 Jul 2014

Chad Pergram ✔ @ChadPergram
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Rep Spencer Bachus (R-AL): We have 2 good bills. We're going to get the votes...I hope some of my colleagues grow up.
3:24 PM - 31 Jul 2014

After the bills passed Friday night, Sessions praised Alabama’s House delegation for their efforts.

“I applaud the hard work of House Republicans in putting together this package, and in particular would like to recognize the steadfast and unflinching efforts from members of our Alabama delegation. The border bill has been substantially improved, and provides a marked contrast to the Senate Democrat bill—defeated on a bipartisan basis—that would have deepened the crisis.

“Most importantly, the House has taken a firm vote today to block the President’s plan to provide unlawful executive amnesty and work permits to 5-6 million illegal immigrants,” Sessions continued. “They have again acted to protect U.S. workers. President Obama’s suspension of immigration law created this crisis and his new plan, if implemented, would escalate that crisis to an unimaginable degree.”

The action now moves to the Senate, where Republicans are facing an uphill battle in the Democratic-controlled body.

“It won’t pass the Senate,” President Obama said Friday. “And if it did, I would veto it.”

http://yellowhammernews.com/nationalpolitics/inside-scoop-alabama-delegation-led-conservative-fight-immigration/


Note: Spencer Bachus if "retiring" at the end of his current term. We will remember him as the Congressman that conducted stock trades from his office based on insider trading for his own personal gain.