Texas Sen. John Cornyn (R) appeared on the Andrea Tantaros Show this morning to discuss a range of issues. Cornyn said that Chuck Hagel is an “ideological soulmate” with President Barack Obama, and will preside over the weakening of our national defense if he is approved as the next defense secretary. Cornyn also questioned the Obama administration’s response to the civil war in Syria, which has claimed 60,000 lives so far.

But with immigration reform plans swirling around Washington, Cornyn warned that the debate must go through the regular congressional process and not be hijacked or subverted by the administration.

Tantaros asks Cornyn “What are your greatest concerns” about the Gang of Eight plan that was announced Monday in Washington.

“Andrea, I think the federal government, and particularly Congress, has a real credibility gap when it comes to enforcing the current law,” Cornyn replied. Cornyn said that he wants to encourage efforts to truly reform our “broken immigration system,” but “I do worry that people get the cart ahead of the horse and start talking about things like a pathway to citizenship before they talk about the prerequisites to that. And really, what I would consider to be necessary confidence-building measures to show that the federal government and Congress can be trusted when it comes to border security and when it comes to work site enforcement.”

Tantaros noted that Democratic Sens. Chuck Schumer (NY) and Dick Durbin (IL) have both publicly moved toward approving measures to improve border security, but President Obama has not. She asked, is the new debate an opportunity to get the president to move toward securing the border, or expose him for being unreasonable?

“I am for engaging on this issue,” Cornyn said. “It’s tough, it’s complicated, parts of it are very controversial. But I do think we need to address it and solve it if we can. But it can only happen, not when eight well-intentioned people meet in a room behind closed doors and then appear with a four-page outline.”

Cornyn continued: “This needs to go through the regular procedure here in the House and the Senate. Let the committees have hearings, invite witnesses in that will testify on all sides of the issue. And give the kind of transparency and confidence to the American people that isn’t going to be another ObamaCare — a 2700 page bill that people haven’t had a time to digest and don’t really have the time to understand the consequences of.”

The Andrea Tantaros Show with Jason Mattera is produced by the Fox and Rice Experience.