Thread: ICE Director to Congress: We Follow Obama’s Policies, Not Law

This is on the Congress. The Congress is and EQUAL branch of government and held by a majority that vowed to stop this lawlwssness if elected - they have FAILED so far and are showing themselves to be political opportunists and liars.

ICE Director to Congress: We Follow Obama’s Policies, Not Law

WRITTEN BY: SUZANNE HAMNER
PUBLISHED ON: APRIL 17, 2015

If your employer gave you a directive to do something that was against the law, particularly federal law, would you do it? If you are the director of US Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and your name is Sarah Saldana, you would follow your employer’s directive and commit a crime. In a testimony before a House Budget Committee subcommittee, Rep. David Young (R-Iowa) voiced concern about reports that ICE officials were not sure whether to follow the law and enforce it as it is written, or follow a unilateral directive issued by the White House via Barack Hussein Obama that basically relaxes “deportation efforts against what they call low-priority illegal immigrants.” These days, that is code for “everyone who crosses the border” – especially when in groups of 20 or more.
Young stated in the hearing with Saldana, “If I had policies that were contrary to the law, I would understand if they didn’t want to follow them. I would expect them to follow the law first.”

In response to this, Saldana replied, “And that’s where you and I probably have a fundamental disagreement.”

The Daily Caller reports:

The back and forth began when Young asked Saldana to respond to Obama’s comment in February, when he said ICE officials needed to follow the White House orders to relax enforcement against immigrants it has deemed to be a low priority for deportation. “If someone’s working for ICE, and there’s a policy and they don’t follow the policy, there are going to be consequences to it,” Obama said then.

Those “consequences” have been widely interpreted to mean ICE officials could be fired for not following Obama’s new instructions on immigration.




Young asked Saldana if Obama’s comments concerned her in any way, given the implication that Obama was asking ICE to enforce his own directive, and not US law.

“I’m trying to be honest with you, sir,” Saldana replied. “No.”

Saldana then had the nerve to compare Obama’s directive to ignore/violate the immigration law to a normal directiveany company or congressman might give an employee or staff person.

Saldana stated, “I imagine you have staff that you expect to comply with your directives and your policies. I imagine the typical employer in the United States has employees who they expect to follow their directives, their policies.”

When Young asked Saldana if “she sees Obama’s comments as a threat to ICE officials,” Saldana laughed and said, “A threat? I’m here of my own volition and will. I’m just trying to help the United States of America and our country on issues that are so divisive.”
Young, in a radio interview with Simon Conway in Iowa later in the day, said he was “floored by Saldana’s statement,” and “couldn’t believe her answer.”

If this had been any other administration and the first time any head of an agency/department had overlooked the law in favor of the whims of the “emperor” Obama, many would be “floored” and in disbelief. However, this is status quo for the Obama administration and Obama so it is just business as usual to follow directives, no matter the law.

In average America, if your employer/supervisor told you to do something contrary to law and you did it, especially federal law, you would be committing a crime and held accountable – no defense of “following directives or policy” would be allowed. Their stance would be that you are obligated to follow the law first. In other words, you would not be allowed the “Obama defense” as afforded to Saldana, Lerner, or any other of Obama’s lackeys.

This is not talking about a directive or policy such as “no fraternization” or “no smoking, drinking or drug use while on the job.” Those are directives or policies issued by employers. This is about telling officials to violate the law on a “say so” by the president. The president is afforded by the Constitution the power to issue executive orders; but, only to ensure the “the laws be faithfully executed.” No president has the authority to issue an executive order to instruct agencies and their personnel to violate constitutional law nor to usurp authority to become the legislative branch. Basically, it’s Obama’s “policy” to not follow the law and make the law on his own so he is instructing others to follow in his lawlessness.

I wonder how the IRS would react if everyone decided not to pay income tax or the unconstitutional Obamacare “penalty tax” because the law was not liked by the people or their employer told them not to file their annual return? You can bet they would disagree with pulling a “John Boehner” and Saldana’s argument that employer directives should be followed despite the law. The IRS would take every possession from you and throw you under the jail for such action; unless, again, you are Al Sharpton, a member of Congress, or anyone in a federal government position.

What is of particular interest is her comment “I’m just trying to help the United States of America and our country on issues that are so divisive.”

The United States of America and our country? Excuse me, but the United States of America is our country. Her statement makes it sound like she is negotiating some agreement between two countries – the United States of America and the country in which she aligns herself. Being this concerns illegal alien invasion across our southern border, surely she isn’t suggesting that she’s helping Mexico, as well as the United States, at the direction of Obama. At this point, one could believe that would be true; after all, it is Obama and his whimsical orders she’s following.

Based on the attitude of Saldana, one can practically assume that the law is basically no more, at least where the government is concerned with following Obama’s orders seem to trump the law. Congress is basically a “front.” No longer is it a checks and balances branch against the executive and judicial. The law is now what Obama says it is, according to him, and Saldana echoes that sentiment. If truth be told, Congress follows it as well or they would follow the remedy of impeachment as prescribed in the Constitution.
This country has morphed, “transformed fundamentally,” into the law of man. When one man in a country has the authority, by hook or by crook, to suspend law, rewrite law, make law, order agency heads about like a “military commander” and ignore the law, it means that country is a dictatorship or monarchy. When laws apply only to the common average occupant of that country and not to those in official positions or those favored by the government, it means that country is an oligarchy. The United States, once a proud constitutional republic based on the protection of individual rights and equality under the law, is now, unofficially, a dictatorial oligarchy, a country now ruled by the law of men, unequal in its enforcement and subject to change at a whim.


Read more at http://sonsoflibertymedia.com/2015/0...icies-not-law/

These directives could not have stood without Holder's approval. and Lynch would not be AG if she had not agreed to accept Holder's understanding of law. And a Republican controlled Senate just approved Lynch as AG.

To be sure resting is not an option, wonder what we do not know about Washington D,C. If you can sleep on that question, you let me know what sleep aids you use.

IMO the problem is that neither major party is willing to insist on policies which benefit the American people.

'Bamacrats want the future votes of those Undocumented Democrats, the Repub leadership wants to give their big money donors the additional surplus labor that those donors covet.

Some of the Tea Party faction do seem willing to support policies which benefit Americans, but there don't seem to be enough of them, to determine policy.
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Americans first in this magnificent country

American jobs for American workers

Fair trade, not free trade

So if the President says it's his policy to kill all who oppose his policies, would the managers and directors of DHS execute his orders?

Lawmaker Questions ICE Sec. on ICE Officers, Border Patrol Agents Being Ordered to Obey Policy Rather Than the Law

By: Anthony Kimery, Editor-in-Chief

05/21/2015 ( 4:50pm)

On April 15, during a House Committee on Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security hearing, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Assistant Secretary Sarah Saldaña engaged in a testy exchange when she told Rep. David Young (R-Iowa) ICE officers and Border Patrol agents should abide by President Obama’s new policy directives on immigration rather than the law.

The revelation came about during the hearing when Young brought up accounts of ICE officials and Border Patrol agents who’ve been instructed to follow the President’s new directives on immigration.

Young questioned Saldaña about the reports that if ICE officers and Border Patrol agents do not follow the President’s policy directives in lieu of the law, that they will face consequences for not doing so.

Young told Saldaña that, "If I had policies or directives that were contrary to the law, I would understand if my employees did not want to follow them. I would expect them to follow the law first."

Saldaña responded, saying, "That is where you and I probably have a fundamental disagreement.”

Saldana's response was found especially peculiar given that she previously served as the United States Attorney for the Northern District of Texas, and prior to that, served as an Assistant US Attorney for the Northern District of Texas.

"Honestly, her answer shocked me,” Young said. “I initially could not believe a senior official was admitting that administration policy trumps the law. I decided more needed to be done, we must get to the bottom of this and get some answers."

Young said he’s concerned about policy trumping law because, "We have heard reports of agents who face retribution or threats for following the law. ICE agents are diligently working to enforce the laws of this nation. They should not be worried about facing disciplinary action for faithfully executing their duty.”

This past week, both ICE field officers and Border Patrol agents have told Homeland Security Today they’d indeed been given “policy” instructions on how to implement and follow Obama’s directives on handling illegal immigration.

“Yes, I know some of us who’ve been told there would be retribution for not following these new policies,” an ICE officer said.

As a consequence of such claims by agents in the filed, Young and four additional members of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security wrote Saldaña on May 15 asking her to provide specific answers to the questions put to her in their letter regarding ICE's actions to implement the President’s policies.

“We are greatly troubled by this administration's directives attempting to supersede immigration enforcement protocols laid out in federal law,” the lawmakers’ letter to Saldana stated. “Just as troubling is President Obama's assertion that Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents who do not follow his directives will be held ‘answerable to the head of the Department of Homeland Security,’ and ‘there will be consequences to it.’”

“When questioned during the hearing about your actions to implement the President's policies, you stated that you have a ‘fundamental disagreement’ that ICE agents should follow federal law if a superior has instructed them not to. We want to be clear: your agency is not above the law, and you and your employees are expected to uphold the laws of this country, as you have sworn to,” the lawmakers wrote.

Young and his fellow legislators stated, “We have heard reports of agents who face retribution or threats for following the law. ICE agents are diligently working to enforce the laws of this nation. They should not be worried about facing disciplinary action for faithfully executing their duty.”

Young and the other signatories to the letter asked Saldana to respond to the following four questions by June 5:

*The legal rationale ICE has used to justify holding executive memos as superior to the plain language of federal statute and how that allows you to punish agents who are following the law;

*The protocols agents have been instructed to follow dealing with the President's directives and current guidelines on the disciplinary actions that agents face for not following them;

*To date, has ICE taken any adverse actions against any career employee for not following the President's policy and what are the details of that action?

*Lastly, if these executive actions are ultimately found to be illegal through the current litigation challenging them and struck down by a federal court, how will punished agents receive restitution in full from ICE?


“You are responsible for making sure these agents are equipped with the resources they need to do this, not threaten them with punishment for it” the lawmakers concluded their letter to Saldana.

“Congressman Young is going to stay on this issue; he is looking for greater clarity from Assistant Secretary Sarah Saldaña and the Obama administration on four specific questions,” a spokesperson said.

http://www.hstoday.us/industry-news/...397d75289.html