WASHINGTON -- One day before illegal aliens were set to apply for work permits and legal protections, the administration announced Tuesday that it would delay carrying out President Barack Obama's executive actions on immigration, saying a federal judge's last-minute ruling had tied the White House's hands.
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Obama promised an appeal and predicted he'd prevail. He said he disagreed with the ruling by U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen of Texas that the administration had exceeded its authority, but he said he must abide by the decision.
"We're not going to disregard this federal court ruling," he said, adding that administration officials would continue preparations to roll out the program. "I think the law is on our side and history is on our side."
"The Department of Justice, legal scholars, immigration experts and even other courts have said that our actions are well within our legal authority," Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a statement. "Our actions will also benefit the economy and promote law enforcement. We fully expect to ultimately prevail in the courts."
The administration could seek a stay of the order in addition to appealing to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans. Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday that the Justice Department was deciding its next move.
"I've always expected that this is a matter that will ultimately be decided by a higher court -- if not the Supreme Court, then a federal court of appeals," Holder said.
Obama's directives would make as many as 5 million illegal aliens in the United States eligible for three-year deportation stays and work permits. Mostly those are people who have been in the country for more than five years and have children who are U.S. citizens or legal permanent residents.
Applications for the first phase were to begin today, when as many as 300,000 people brought illegally to the country as children could begin applying for an expansion of Obama's 2012 program aimed at the younger migrants.
But Hanen, who was appointed by President George W. Bush, ordered a halt to those executive actions late Monday, ruling that a coalition of 26 states had standing to challenge them.
Hanen found that the states had satisfied the minimum legal requirements to bring their lawsuit. He said the administration had failed to comply with basic administrative procedures for putting such a sweeping program into effect.
"No statute gives the DHS the discretion it is trying to exercise here," Hanen wrote in his ruling.
In his opinion, Hanen accused administration officials of being "disingenuous" when they said the president's initiatives did not significantly alter existing policies. He wrote that the programs were "a massive change in immigration practice" that would affect "the nation's entire immigration scheme and the states who must bear the lion's share of its consequences."
Hanen said the executive actions had violated laws that the federal government must follow to issue new rules, and he determined "the states have clearly proven a likelihood of success on the merits."
Hanen's ruling means those under the age of 16 who arrived on or before January 2010 won't be able to apply for the program, said David Leopold, past president of the American Immigration Lawyers Association. But the ruling has little effect on deportations.
"None of this has to do with starting or stopping deportations," Leopold said. "They were already using all of the resources available in deporting as many people per year."
Hanen has been an outspoken critic of the administration on immigration policy, including accusing the administration of participating in conspiracies to smuggle children into the U.S. by helping reunite them with parents who live here illegally.
In a December 2013 order in an immigrant-smuggling case, he expressed frustration that he had four situations in a month in which children who illegally arrived in the U.S. alone were reunited with their parents.
Hanen sentenced a smuggler to 10 months in prison in that case but saved his most withering words for the U.S. government for not arresting and deporting the mother who hired the smuggler to get her 10-year-old daughter into the U.S. from El Salvador. The government generally reunites such children with their relatives temporarily, pending deportation proceedings.
"Instead of arresting [the child's mother] for instigating the conspiracy to violate our border security laws, the [Homeland Security Department] delivered the child to her -- thus successfully completing the mission of the criminal conspiracy," Hanen wrote.
Decision buoys GOP
Monday's ruling was issued as Republicans attempt to use a Department of Homeland Security spending bill to reverse Obama's immigration orders. Republican lawmakers seized on the decision, saying it bolsters their efforts.
In a series of statements Tuesday, Republican leaders in Congress and officials at conservative organizations showed no signs of relenting.
They said they would continue to hold up the money unless the Homeland Security Department funding bill included language that would stop the immigration programs. Republicans called on Senate Democrats to end a filibuster of that legislation.
"This ruling underscores what the president has already acknowledged publicly 22 times: He doesn't have the authority to take the kinds of actions he once referred to as 'ignoring the law' and 'unwise and unfair,'" Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in a statement. "Senate Democrats -- especially those who've voiced opposition to the president's executive overreach -- should end their partisan filibuster of Department of Homeland Security funding."
Jenny Beth Martin, a founder of the Tea Party Patriots, said in a statement that the ruling "points out the lawless, overreaching nature of President Obama's actions."
Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, the Senate's No. 3 Democrat, said court action should free Republicans of their political obligation to fight over Homeland Security Department funding.
"It's perfectly appropriate to take this issue to court, but it is completely unacceptable for Republicans to hold up funding for the Department of Homeland Security while the case wends its way through the legal system," he said after the judge's ruling.
The department's $40 billion budget runs out Feb. 27, and with Congress now on recess, lawmakers will have only a few days to reach an agreement once they return to Washington next week.
The Senate has voted three times and failed to advance the House-passed bill. McConnell has scheduled another vote for Monday.
One possibility is a short-term extension of current funding levels, but House Speaker John Boehner said over the weekend that the House had done its job and he would "certainly" let a shutdown occur if the Senate didn't act.
Shortly after taking over as majority leader, McConnell promised that there would be no government shutdowns. Some political operatives Tuesday said the judge's ruling could provide a way out of the legislative impasse by allowing Republicans to argue that the fight is best left to the courts.
At the same time, the ruling also could embolden the most hard-line Republicans, giving them the confidence to double down on their legislative strategy now that they believe the courts are on their side.
Senate Democrats remained united Tuesday, with leadership aides signaling that the conference will oppose any Homeland Security funding measure that blocks the president's immigration programs.
At least three of the Senate Democrats whom Republicans are trying to get to switch their votes aren't expected to change their positions.
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., has expressed misgivings about the president's executive actions. But Jonathan Kott, a spokesman for Manchin, said the senator "still believes that we should pass a clean DHS funding bill."
Aides for Sens. Claire McCaskill of Missouri and Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota said the two Democrats hold the same view.
Delay a letdown
Many illegal aliens expressed disappointment with Hanen's ruling.
"We feel powerless but not defeated, sure that it will all work out," 46-year-old Claudia Ramon, a native of Colombia, said at a rally in Houston, one of dozens nationwide where illegal aliens and their advocates vowed to continue with preparations under Obama's programs.
Ramon said she and her daughters did not give one another presents for Christmas because they were saving their money to pay the application fees for the immigration program.
With the delay, the family now plans on exchanging small gifts today.
Keyla Betancurth, who grew up in Guatemala, said she used to watch her single mother cry at night because she could not afford to buy food for her children. She left school at 12 to work at a bakery to help. Then, at 17, she took a bigger step, paying a smuggler to get her to the U.S.
"I wanted a better future for myself and for my mom," the 28-year-old said. "Now, I'm a mother, and I want the best for my kids. I don't want my kids to suffer like I did."
Jessica Nunez, 40, and her husband have been in the U.S. for 18 years and have three U.S.-born children.
Originally from Santana, in the Mexican state of Sonora, Nunez lives in Tucson, Ariz., and has been gathering the paperwork to apply to the new program.
Nunez said life without legal status has been tough, especially when family emergencies arise in Mexico and she can't go back.
"It's like they have our hands tied," she said.
Immigration advocates pledged to redouble their efforts to sign up as many people as possible for the programs.
"It's extremely important for the community to understand, from a legal perspective, it is on solid legal footing and actually the larger numbers of people who come forward to apply, the more likely we can protect the expansion" of Obama's immigration programs, said Marielena Hincapie, executive director of the National Immigration Law Center.
Information for this article was contributed by Michael D. Shear, Ashley Parker and Julia Preston of The New York Times; by Erica Werner, Jim Kuhnhenn, Eric Tucker, Juan Lozano, Amy Taxin, Donna Bryson, Astrid Galvan and staff members of The Associated Press; and by Heidi Przybyla, Toluse Olorunnipa, James Rowley, Kathleen Miller, Jonathan Allen, Annie Linskey and Angela Greiling Keane of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 02/18/2015