SCOTUS Deadlocks On Obamnesty, As Expected

by JASmius



Not that it will make any difference or threaten the Immigration Proclamation in the slightest, as we'll see momentarily:

Barack Obama's bid to save his [unlawful, illegal, unconstitutional] plan to spare millions of [alien]s in the country illegally from deportation and give them work permits ran into trouble on Monday at the U.S. Supreme Court in a case testing the limits of presidential power.

The court, with four conservative justices and four liberals, seemed divided along ideological lines during ninety minutes of arguments in the case brought by twenty-six States led by Texas that sued to block Obama's [unlawful, illegal, unconstitutional] 2014 executive action that bypassed Congress.

Instead of simply nullifying it with their Original Authority.

Liberal justices voiced support for Obama's action. The conservatives sounded skeptical. A 4-4 decision would be a grim defeat for Obama because it would uphold lower court rulings that threw out his action last year and doom his quest to revamp a U.S. immigration policy he calls broken....

Wanna bet (see below)?

In order to win, Obama would need the support of one of the court's conservatives, most likely Chief Justice John Roberts or [Justice] Anthony Kennedy. But they both at times hit the Obama administration's lawyer, U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, with tough questions.

Which doesn't really mean anything, as we've seen countless times before from this bogus tea leaf-reading.

Kennedy expressed concern that Obama had exceeded his authority by having the executive branch set immigration policy rather than carry out laws passed by Congress.

"It's as if the president is setting the policy and the Congress is executing it. That's just upside down," Kennedy said.

It was before January 20th, 2009, and the adoption of the Obamatution.  Now it's the "Executive Order of the land".

A ruling is due by the end of June.

And, assuming that ruling is the anticipated tie, the effect upon Obamnesty will be....non-existent.  Why?  Because the track record of the Obama Regime is that SCOTUS rulings are beneath their notice and contempt only unless and until they are unanimous, as when they slapped down O's illegal recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board 9-0 a few years ago.  In this case, they'll look at the even split leaving in place the adverse decision of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, sniff, and keep right on pushing it forward, just as they did last November when the Fifth Circuit ruled against them and almost a year ago when federal District Judge Andrew Hanen did the same.  And given those parameters, the loss of Antonin Scalia from the high court has no bearing on the outcome.

This is what will constitute a "win" so Pyrrhic as to be indistinguishable from defeat.

But maybe Roberts or Kennedy will surprise us and make the White House's true victory de jure rather than just de facto.  The only difference between the two is whose face gets saved, after all.