Of Course, They Would Never Mislead about What’s in the Immigration Bill



According to NBC News – not Fox, not Breitbart, not The Blaze – but NBC News, President Obama and senior members of his administration misled the American people about being able to keep their existing health care coverage once Obamacare took effect.

It turns out that as early as 2010 the White House knew that “more than 40 to 67 percent of those in the individual market would not be able to keep their plans, even if they liked them.” That did not stop the president saying as recently as 2012 that, “If [you]already have health insurance, you will keep your health insurance.” Nevertheless, 50 to 75 percent of Americans who now have individual policies that they were promised they’d be able to keep can expect to get cancellation notices (if they haven’t already).

Of course, the administration would never resort to that sort of bait-and-switch tactic just to get their cherished illegal alien amnesty bill through Congress, would they? It’s not as though this administration would ever engage in a little deception to make their deportation numbers appear more robust than they really are. It’s not like the president would ever deny that he lacks the constitutional authority to grant administrative amnesty to entire classes of illegal aliens, and then turn around and do precisely that.

The message to House Republicans could not be clearer: The administration can and will deceive, mislead, arbitrarily and unilaterally change, and outright ignore any or all of the enforcement provisions of an immigration bill you send to the president’s desk. They will grant waivers or write rules to include anyone they want to include under the amnesty provisions, no matter what eligibility criteria Congress sets.

Given this administration’s track record, there is only one obvious conclusion that can be drawn: Do not send the president an immigration bill to sign.

About Author

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Ira joined the Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR) in 1986 with experience as a journalist, professor of journalism, special assistant to Gov. Richard Lamm (Colorado), and press secretary of the House Defense Appropriations Subcommittee. His columns have appeared in National Review, LA Times, NY Times, Washington Post, Newsweek, and more. He is an experienced TV and radio commentator.

9 Comments

  1. avatar

    The thing sitting in our wh does not upset me, what upset’s , frightens and disgusts me is that it appears many Americans have made the decision to ignore the truth, that the thing sitting in our wh has murdered, bribed, coerced, intimidated, lied to Americans , these Americans are traitors to America, these Americans push America into both a civil war and a revolt. But, then again, I wonder, did Americans really do this? Or did the enemies of America do this? This nation is now ruled based on the whims and desires of a creature whose mentality , intelligence does not even equal that of an amoeba, a psycho amoeba. For those who have noticed, law no longer exists, only tyranny.

  2. avatar

    American are suffering what is called in psychology “Cognitive Bias”. (The tendency to think in certain ways, it can lead to a systematic deviation from good judgemet).

  3. avatar

    If you like your doctor, you can keep you doctor, if you have insurance, you can keep your insurance. That is what the President told on television to the nation. Many people still argue that the President is telling the truth.
    Sure, a man as truthfull as Obama whith his transparent administration, there is not doubt he is telling the truth. Remember Benghazi, he is still working to find what really happened to tell the american people the truth. Immigration is as clear as his administration. Until you discover what is in it.

  4. avatar

    Apparently, part of the Obama administration’s strategy for passing the immigration bill, which worked for passing Obamacare, is to withhold information from Congress and the American people before the vote. Examples:
    1. DHS has yet to release its long-overdue FY 2012 yearbook of immigration statistics and estimates of the unauthorized immigrant population residing in the United States as of January 2012.
    2. ICE released only partial data when it touted its “record” number of “deportations” on its website along with data from FY 2008 through FY 2012. Specifically, it released the number of individuals removed in 2008 for only one of its five categories of removal (Convicted Criminals), and it released the number of individuals removed in the Other Removable Aliens category (which includes aliens arrested for general immigration violations) for only 2012. This withholding of the complete data makes it impossible to see how ICE removal operations have changed since the Bush administration. For example, by withholding the number of Border Removals in 2008, DHS has prevented us from seeing how much of their touted increase is due simply to some of the border crossers that were counted as returns under Bush now being counted as removals. And by withholding the numbers of Other Removable Aliens before 2012, DHS has prevented us from getting a sense of how much the number of people removed for being in the country illegally has declined since Bush.
    3. HHS has yet to release its very-long-overdue FY 2011 report to Congress of the Office of Refugee Resettlement.

    Congressional staff should be investigating why DHS, ICE, and HHS have not released this information and reporting the results to Congress. If there has been any political direction to withhold information, then Congress should ensure that the responsible authorities are removed from office. And until all of the information has been released, Congress should refuse to take up any immigration bill.

  5. avatar

    I think the dream act should be repealed, we didn’t vote for that, and we don’t want it, more benefits for illegals and magnets for them to come here with all their kids

    • avatar

      GG, there isn’t a “Dream Act” to repeal. It was never voted into law; quite the contrary. All there is is an administrative amnesty, under a policy from DHS, that hasn’t the force of law and that is of itself of doubtful legality.

  6. avatar

    Very true. When he was being pressured to just do the Dream Act as an executive order, he said he did not have the power to do that, only Congress did. And then he did just exactly that, instituted it by executive order.

    And the Republicans were foolish to tie Obamacare to the government shutdown. It just gave them a black eye with the public and was unnecessary because the flaws of Obamacare were going to become evident [and did] very quickly. So why give in on amnesty? With no guarantees of enforcement but promises, why would you trust this administration.

  7. avatar

    LOL FAIR

    You’re right on Obamacare inconsistencies….although perhaps you’re giving Obama too much intelligence? I’d throw the other possibility out that he didn’t have a clue what was in the the healthcare bill. Same with his phonebook sized immigration bill.