Dealt Setback, Obama Puts Off Immigrant Plan

*You can say this is just a hurdle and that the Administration’s appeal will prevail, that the president’s executive action on immigration will eventually go into effect. You can also see this as the president’s opposition showing their playbook. There may be more injunctions, more federal orders stopping the program, more appeals and more postponements. I get the feeling we’re in this for a long haul. VL

By Michael D. Shear and Julia Preston, The New York Times

WASHINGTON- One day before hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants were to begin applying for work permits and legal protection, administration officials on Tuesday postpones President Obama’s sweeping executive actions on immigration indefinaltely, saying they had no choice but to comply with a federal judge’s last-minute order halting the programs.

The judge’s ruling was a significant setback for the president, who had asserted broad authority to take executive actions in the face of congressional Republicans’ refusal to overhaul the immigration system. White House officials have defended the president’s actions as legal and proper even as his adversaries in Congress and the states have accused him of vastly exceeding the powers of his office.

In a decision late Monday, Judge Andrew S. Hanen,of Federal District court for the Southern District of Texas, in Brownsville, rules in favor of Texas and 25 other states that had challenged Mr. Obama’s immigration actions. The judge said that the administration’s programs would impose major burdens on states, unleashing illegal immigration and straining state budgets, and that the administration had not followed required procedures for changing federal rules.

Click HERE to read the full story.