A federal judge in Pennsylvania deemed President Obama’s executive action on immigration unconstitutional, though his opinion is seen as unlikely to influence the implementation of the president’s unilateral move.
In a criminal case involving a Honduran immigrant charged with unlawfully re-entering the country, U.S. District Court Judge Arthur Schwab chose to make a broader statement on Obama’s plan to protect up to 5 million illegal immigrants from deportation.
“It provides for a systematic and rigid process by which a broad group of individuals will be treated differently than others based upon arbitrary classifications, rather than case-by-case examination,” the judge ruled. “It allows undocumented immigrants, who fall within these broad categories, to obtain substantive rights.”
Separate cases are pending in Washington and Texas directly challenging the president’s immigration action. Those cases are seen as the more realistic avenue for undoing the president’s immigration power play.
However, Schwab is the first judge to go on record saying Obama is overstepping his legal authority. His declaration could give GOP critics ammunition heading into a 2015 showdown with the White House over the immigration plan.
Schwab said Obama’s decree “violates the separation of powers provided for in the United States Constitution as well as the Take Care Clause, and therefore, is unconstitutional.”
