{"id":5506,"date":"2013-12-22T10:30:41","date_gmt":"2013-12-22T15:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/live-immigrationreform.pantheonsite.io\/?p=5506"},"modified":"2018-12-28T15:20:30","modified_gmt":"2018-12-28T20:20:30","slug":"the-12-days-of-amnesty-the-10th-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.immigrationreform.com\/2013\/12\/22\/the-12-days-of-amnesty-the-10th-day\/","title":{"rendered":"The 12 Days of Amnesty…the 10th Day"},"content":{"rendered":"

On the 10<\/b>th<\/sup><\/b>\u00a0<\/b>Day of Amnesty, Secretary Napolitano was sued by<\/b><\/p>\n

\u202610 ICE agents.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"12<\/a><\/p>\n

After years of the Obama administration\u00a0dismantling<\/a>\u00a0immigration enforcement, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents had enough. Ten of them\u00a0united to sue<\/a>\u00a0the then Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano and ICE Director John Morton.<\/p>\n

The ICE agents\u00a0claimed<\/a>\u00a0that\u00a0the DHS leaders violated federal law by using prosecutorial discretion to grant administrative amnesty to broad classes of illegal aliens.\u00a0The agents\u00a0argued<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 and a Texas district court has agreed \u2014 that the deferred action program for illegal aliens under 31 years-old forces them to violate federal law by prohibiting them from arresting or placing in removal proceedings every illegal alien they encounter who is not clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted to the United States.<\/p>\n

Understandably, ICE agents were\u00a0concerned<\/a>\u00a0that this non-enforcement was not only illegal but dangerous. However, many feared that any effort to speak truth to power would leave them without a job.<\/p>\n

The lawsuit helped highlight an oft ignored problem. Though the judge found that the directive protecting \u201cDREAMers\u201d from deportation\u00a0was illegal<\/a>, the agents were not given \u201cstanding\u201d to challenge its implementation. In short, ICE agents\u00a0must break<\/a>\u00a0federal immigration law because the administration illegally ordered them to.