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Today in Extremism: November 24, 2014, Anchor Babies, Spanking, and Bankruptcy

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Since President Obama’s executive action announcement, we’ve been collecting notes on how Republican members of Congress and their right-wing base have responded to the news.  There’s been talk of impeachment, imprisonment, war, and ethnic cleansing — and Congress isn’t even in session.  Here’s what conservatives and anti-immigrant extremists have been saying in the last few days:

  • Politico got it right today with its article on “Steve Kingmaker” on how Steve King is determined to be a power player in his home state of Iowa’s unique role in choosing presidential nominees.  We’ve said time and time again that the Republican Party is giving an unfortunate amount of power to Steve King — the House voted four times this session to deport DREAMers  — and King’s positioning in Iowa is just more evidence.  It’s pretty scary when King, a guy who talks about executive action turning “anchor babies” into “human shields” for their parents also credibly says things like “I have this wonderful, wonderful privilege to have this tremendous access to the likely presidential candidates.  And it is a terrific privilege.”
  • According to Breitbart and Michele Bachmann, Republican leadership is planning to ‘stay positive’ and ‘not engage’ with Obama over his executive action (which, if true, would be wise, considering today’s Latino Decisions polling).  Bachmann is not happy about that: “‘We will not engage,’ she reiterated with disgust.”
  • Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) said that executive action will lead to “insolvency and bankruptcy of our government“*.  Also check out this interview where MSNBC’s Chris Hayes asks Brooks about former President Reagan’s executive actions and Brooks literally replies, “I have not examined what Bill Clinton did.”
  • Conservative author Dinesh D’Souza, weirdly enough, wants to give Obama a “spanking“*.
  • Greg Abbott, the next governor of Texas, called executive action the “epitome of lawlessness.”  He’s also planning to sue Obama over it.
  • Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) said that Obama is in the business of “counterfeiting immigration papers.”
  • Former presidential candidate Rick Santorum called Obama a “tyrant” who is “backing Americans into a corner”*.  He added, “The president has just slapped in the face every House and Senate member, saying we don’t need you anymore.”
  • Talk radio host Michael Savage compared Obama to Hitler*, unsurprisingly not the first commentator to do so.
  • Possible presidential contender Ben Carson compared Obama to Putin.
  • Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) said that Obama and “liberal attack people” want “violence” and “mayhem” out of this executive order*.
  • NumbersUSA said that allowing DACA recipients into the military is “unbelievably dangerous”* — apparently forgetting that the first person to die in Iraq in 2003 was an undocumented immigrant.
  • A National Review contributor claimed that legislative immigration reform could’ve passed by now if Democrats were willing to compromise on legalization rather than demanding citizenship.  Our response: legalization without citizenship was one plank of the House GOP principles released in January.  Even that weak-sauce proposal was never heard from again.  If legalization without citizenship is the GOP’s position now, they should introduce a bill.
  • Michael Peroutka, a Christian radical, called Obama’s executive order an “act of treason” and called for local governments to oppose it*.
  • And finally, Moe Lane at RedState seems to be having trouble with a comment that Kris Kobach recently made.  See, Kobach recently worried that Obama’s executive action could lead us down a slippery slope that ends in “ethnic cleansing.”  When the DNC blasted that comment, Moe Lane somehow interpreted that as the DNC making a comment that GOP opposition to executive action would lead to ethnic cleansing.  When corrected, Lane dismissed Kobach as an unimportant “minor statewide official.”  Earth to Lane: Kobach was Mitt Romney’s advisor on immigration — and he’s now the GOP’s go-to guy in lawsuits against Obama’s executive action.

*  These links are from our good friends at Right Wing Watch.