Why Liberals Should Applaud the Supreme Court’s Immigration Ruling

Following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia, it seemed likely that there would be a num­ber of 4-4 split rulings in the Supreme Court. One such ruling has liberals in an uproar: the split in United States v. Texas. The court’s split allows the lower court’s ruling to stand. This means that the injunction District Court Judge Andrew Hanen issued will stand, block­ing President Obama’s expansion of the DAPA and DACA programs. These programs would have allowed the President to give certain illegal immigrants “deferred action” status, exempting them from deportation. To be clear, the ruling does not mean that Obama’s actions are uncon­stitutional. The ruling simply upheld the injunc­tion, meaning that the administration will have to wait for Hanen’s final ruling to see if it can implement the new reforms. However, based on the estimated length of the trial and Obama’s closing term, it seems that the president’s hope of achieving substantive immigration reform before he leaves office will not be realized. In general, liberals are less concerned about the ruling’s effect on Obama’s legacy than they are about its effect on immigrants. In their view— which I, for the record, agree with—Obama’s ac­tions on immigration were positive steps. Even though Obama’s actions were correct from a policy standpoint, liberals should be happy that the Supreme Court did not rule in his favor.

The issue with how the left has viewed this case is that it has ignored the bigger picture in fa­vor of focusing on the case’s specifics. In other words, the left’s anger over how the Court struck down Obama’s actions has limited its ability to realize just how big of a win this case actual­ly was for them. Before I dive into why exactly liberals should be pleased with the outcome of the case, there is one part of this case, which the court did not touch, that deserves more at­tention than it has received. As part of his rul­ing, Judge Hanen made a very surprising order. In response to the Justice Department serious­ly violating legal ethics, he ruled that he would supervise the entire Justice Department to en­sure that its lawyers would act ethically. Hanen wrote that the Department’s “conduct is cer­tainly not worthy of any department whose name includes the word ‘Justice.’”

What exactly did the Justice Department do? Essentially, it lied. Repeatedly. When Hanen asked the government’s lawyers if the DACA pro­gram in question would be implemented, they replied that it would not go into effect for a few more months. This was a lie. As they said that, thousands of deferrals were already being pro­cessed. Following an order from Hanen to put the entire program on hold, relief continued to be granted under the program. Whatever one’s stance on immigration reform might be, this is truly appalling conduct. Yet by and large the left-wing media was silent, except for a few articles that bizarrely and baselessly portrayed Hanen’s order as some sort of doxing attack. Everyone, re­gardless of political affiliation, should be celebrat­ing this punishment of government misconduct.

But even if liberals accept that Hanen’s order was correct, they will still be upset over his decision to issue an injunction, which, with Obama’s term soon expiring, likely signals the death of the pro­gram. This is the wrong reaction; liberals should be breathing a sigh of relief. They should think of what such a ruling in Obama’s favor would have meant. It would have given the president enormous amounts of power over immigration policy, allowing him or her to do just about any­thing without congressional approval. Imagine if Donald Trump becomes president. What then? Under the ruling that liberals desired, Trump would have more than enough power to enact his racist immigration policy without any input from Congress. While it would be great and beneficial to many for Obama’s policy to be enacted, if such a policy is deemed constitutional, it could have disastrous effects down the line.

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