Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) vowed on the floor of the upper chamber this morning that “if President Obama acts in defiance of the people and imposes his will on the country, Congress will act.”
“We’re considering a variety of options. But make no mistake. When the newly elected representatives of the people take their seats, they will act,” he said in reference to the GOP majority in the 114th Congress.
“Look, as the president has said, democracy is hard. Imposing his will unilaterally may seem tempting. It may serve him politically in the short term. But he knows that it will make an already-broken system even more broken. And he knows that this is not how democracy is supposed to work. Because he told us so himself.”
McConnell resurrected another past quote of Obama’s: “I know some… wish that I could just bypass Congress and change the law myself. But that’s not how democracy works.”
“Indeed, it isn’t,” McConnell said. “All of which makes the president’s planned executive action on immigration even more jarring.”
“If the president truly follows through on this attempt to impose his will unilaterally, he will have issued a rebuke to his own stated view of democracy. And he will have contradicted his past statements on this very issue.”
The senator argued that “we’ve already seen the consequences of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, his most recent action in this area. It was a factor in encouraging young people to risk their lives on a perilous journey some would never complete.”
“The effects of this action could be just as tragic… It isn’t about compassion. It seems to be about what a political party thinks would make for good politics. It seems to be about what a President thinks would be good for his legacy.”
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