John Culberson: “Under the logic of the minority we have heard tonight, it would be that the President has taken this action because of…”

“Under the logic of the minority we have heard tonight, it would be that the President has taken this action because of the inaction of Congress in order to fix a broken immigration system. Under that logic, President George W. Bush would have been within his rightful authority, in order to fix a broken economy, to refuse to collect the capital gains tax, just to issue an executive order, a memorandum by the director of the IRS: Do not collect the capital gains tax, the capital gains tax is now effectively zero, no matter what the law says, to fix a broken economy. I would also point out to my colleagues in the minority that the examples that we have heard tonight of previous Presidents taking action are all based on the President's very broad authority under the war powers, under his authority as Commander in Chief, and also his authority to make treaties and receive foreign ambassadors. In fact, the Supreme Court, Madam Chair, has said that the President is essentially the sole organ of the Federal Government in the field of international relations; so the authority of other Presidents in the past who have taken these actions, they have done so under their authority as Commander in Chief in the area of foreign affairs. We in the House tonight, the new Republican majority in the House, are listening to the voters. We are responding to the overwhelming rejection of President Obama's policies by the American people.…”