Top Non-Story Of The Day: Obama's Executive Action On Immigration Overturned By Judge

Alan: Once again, conservative dimwittedness puts Obama in a win-win situation. 

With near certainty, Judge Hanen's immigration ruling will be overturned. 

But if it is not -- and I can imagine Obama in no hurry to overturn it -- conservative opposition to legal normalization of undocumented immigrants who have long resided in the United States, living admirable lives characterized by high productivity, will alienate American Hispanics just in time to propel a huge turnout in 2016. 

However the horns of this dilemma play out, the GOP has already shot itself in the foot and may have struck an artery.

One of the least known facts concerning electoral politics is that "new voters" who cast their ballot for the same party in three consecutive elections are nearly certain to vote for that party the rest of their lives.

Notably, the angry white guys who comprise The Republican Party have NO source of new voters. 

And the percentage of whites in the voting population continues to dwindle.

Do the math.

A day after Judge Andrew S. Hanen of the federal district court in Brownsville, Texas, issued an injunction preventing the Obama administration from implementing its plan to delay deportation for millions of undocumented immigrants, the status of U.S. immigration policy is as confused and uncertain as ever. A few ideas about what might come next are in the links below.

1. Top story: Policymakers respond to immigration ruling

An appeal could take months. "President Barack Obama's administration faces a difficult and possibly lengthy legal battle to overturn a Texas court ruling that blocked his landmark immigration overhaul, since the judge based his decision on an obscure and unsettled area of administrative law, lawyers said. ... There was no consensus among lawyers with expertise in administrative law and immigration law on whether Hanen would be reversed on appeal. But they said the judge was wise to focus on an area of administrative law where legal precedent is sometimes fuzzy." David Ingram and Mica Rosenberg for Reuters.

Primary source: The opinion.

It doesn't look as though the opinion will resolve the debate in Congress over funding Homeland Security, as some had hoped. "Don’t count on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to play dealmaker in the fight over Department of Homeland Security funding. The Kentucky Republican is under intense pressure from conservatives to hold the line against President Obama’s immigration actions, and he shows no signs of backing down. ... McConnell could have seized on the injunction to push conservatives toward funding the DHS while the court fight plays out. The fact that he didn’t, Senate Democrats say, is a sign that McConnell won’t be coming to the negotiating table." Alexander Bolton in The Hill.

Much of Obama's agenda is now in the hands of the courts. "Along with the immigration action, the fate of two of Obama’s other signature initiatives — a landmark health-care law and a series of aggressive executive actions on climate change — now rests in the hands of federal judges. It is a daunting prospect for a president in the final two years of his tenure who believes he is on the path to leaving a lasting impact on in­trac­table and politically perilous issues, despite an often bitter relationship with Congress." David Nakamura and Juliet Eilperin in The Washington Post.

Here's what you need to know to understand the injunction. The Washington Post.

SUNSTEIN: The judge went too far. "In adopting a plan to allow unlawful immigrants to apply for 'deferred action,' Judge Andrew S. Hanen said, the Department of Homeland Security acted unlawfully because it did not allow the public to comment in advance. With this conclusion, Hanen almost certainly overreached. The law here is based on the 1946 Administrative Procedure Act, which governs many activities of executive agencies. The APA does indeed require Homeland Security to seek public comment on any 'proposed rulemaking' -- except it does not have to do so when announces 'general statements of policy.' " Bloomberg View.

Obama might have acted beyond his authority, but Hanen's opinion is poorly reasoned. "To think, as we do, that President Obama overstepped his authority by shielding more than 4 million illegal immigrants from deportation, with no assent from Congress, does not mean that a federal judge should have license to invalidate the president’s order on the basis of tendentious logic.Judge Hanen agreed with the states that their lawsuit cleared minimum procedural requirements and could go forward. He had to stretch so far to reach even that modest conclusion that we hope an appeals court will lift his stay while the case proceeds," argues the editorial board of The Washington Post.