Political Quotes

“Mr. President, I thank the Senator from Texas for his contributions to this very important debate. I believe he helped to clarify a lot of important issues that I hope Members on both sides of the aisle will consider as they cast their votes. I am for comprehensive immigration reform. I have voted that way. That is not what this is about. My bill simply prevents the executive branch from usurping the legislative power by creating categorical exceptions from the law for whole classes of people. That power belongs to Congress. Whether Congress was wrong or whether Congress was right, it does not give the President the authority to write the law on his own, and that is what he has done with his November 2014 Executive order. I wish to make two other points before I close. The first point is there is nothing in my legislation that in any way undoes the more limited 2012 Executive order that applies to the DREAMers--nothing. It doesn't prevent them from being renewed nor does it take away their status. There is nothing that changes that Executive order. The first version of the House bill did, and I opposed that provision and it is not in my bill. The second point I will make is that this debate is not about immigration. It really is about the power of the President versus the powers delineated in our Constitution for Congress and the judicial branch. I will close, once again, with President Obama's own words, because he got it right back in September of 2013.…”