Congress CAN Pull Financial Rug From Under Obama’s Immigration Amnesty

By David Martosko | MailOnline

Conservatives in the U.S. Senate got a powerful weapon on Wednesday in the battle over whether they can pull the rug out from under President Barack Obama’s plan to mainstream millions of illegal immigrants into American life.

Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, the Republican’ top budget hawk, has unveiled a Nov. 21 memo from the Congressional Research Service (CRS) explaining that Congress can legally strip funding from America’s immigration enforcement agency – including funds the agency raises on its own through fees it charges Americans and foreigners.

That news will put fuel in the tank of right-wingers who want to paint Obama into a corner when the GOP controls both houses of Congress in January.

Citing ‘Congress’s constitutional power over the purse,’ the CRS – Capitol Hill’s official nonpartisan research arm – instructed Sessions that lawmakers can pick and choose what executive branch agencies can spend money on.

‘An agency is not free simply to disregard’ those orders, the memo read.

Republican civil war broke out after Obama’s Nov. 20 ‘amnesty’ speech over whether the GOP can stop the White House from issuing green cards and work permits
Congress’s official fact-checkers now say the new Republican majority on Capitol Hill can legally pull the plug
At issue is whether immigration authorities can do whatever they want with fees they collect from immigrants, both legal and illegal
One congressional aide proposed a hypothetical situation where the Department of the Interior diverted National Parks entrance fees to give ‘tap-dance lessons to grizzly bears’
‘If we could stop that, we can stop this,’ the staffer insisted