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Anti-Immigrant Personalities React to President Obama's DREAM Policy Announcement

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Last Friday, President Obama took to the airwaves to announce a bold new deportation strategy for DREAM Act youth: effective immediately, DREAMers who meet certain criteria will be protected from deportation and eligible to apply for work permits.

While commentators and editorial boards all over the nation applauded the long-awaited development, there were, of course, haters who panned the policy change.  Here’s a rundown of the worst:

Columnist and Fox News commentator Charles Krauthammer: “This is out and out lawlessness.  You had a clip of the president himself say months ago ‘I cannot do this on my own because there are laws on the books.’ Well, I have news for the president: The laws remain on the books, they haven’t changed”

Blogger and Fox News commentator Michelle Malkin: The new policy “put[s] politics above national security and the rule of law.”

Shock jock radio host Rush Limbaugh: “Forty years ago Nixon was hounded out of office.  Whatever Nixon did pales in comparison to just this move today, Obama declaring amnesty for 800,000 illegals.”

Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, who signed the infamous state anti-immigrant law HB 56: “This was an outrageous announcement…that intends to grant back-door amnesty.  It doesn’t take a cynic to recognize this action for what it is, blatant political pandering.”

Anti-immigrant extremist Congressman Steve King (R-IA): “I will tell you that — I’m not without experience on this — I’m prepared to bring a suit and seek a court order to stop implementation of this policy.”

Representative Allen West (R-FL): “I can start to ask questions about what is going to happen as far as their right to vote. Is this one of those backdoor opportunities to allow people in the next five months to get the opportunity to vote? Will we see Janet Napolitano and the president come out with a new edict that says ‘since we allow this people to be here legally, we’re now going to allow them to have the opportunity to vote?’”

Former Bush Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez: “To halt through executive order the deportation of some undocumented immigrants looks like a political calculation to win Hispanic votes and subjects [Obama] to criticism that he is violating his oath of office by selectively failing to enforce the law.”

Former presidential candidate and former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum:  “So you’re seeing a pattern where the president says, ‘I’m going to pick and choose what laws I’m going to enforce, what laws I’m going to stand up and fight for in court.’ That is not the job of the president.  There’s a difference between saying, ‘I don’t like the law, I wish the law were different, but I’m the president. My job is to faithfully execute.’ And he has not faithfully executed.”

Romney immigration advisor, SB 1070 author, and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach: The policy is “illegal” and “deeply troubling…What the president is describing is a policy that we will refuse to initiate deportation proceedings.”

Pinal County Sheriff Paul Babeu: “Shocking…Now we have Obama, Holder, and Napolitano that think they can just unilaterally wave their hand and change the law and policy.”

Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio:  “I think people from Mexico are now going to feel, ‘Hey come on in and we’ll get by with it.‘ But it won’t happen in this county. They will be arrested…we’re still going to enforce all those illegal immigration laws.” *

* As to how he intends to keep enforcing all those anti-immigrant laws, Think Progress reported that mere hours after Obama’s announcement on Friday, Arpaio arrested a 6-year-old undocumented girl who was traveling with 15 other people.  That’s the Sheriff Joe Arpaio enforcement strategy at work, folks: using law enforcement resources to detain and attempt to deport the pernicious threat to homeland security that is the average six year old girl.  Considering that Arpaio has admitted to arresting thousands of immigrants out of spite simply because the federal government started investigating him, we feel pretty confident in saying that Arpaio is now using the arrest and detainment of children in his attempts to sock it to the Obama administration.