Federal Judge Andrew Hanen still hasn't issued a ruling regarding the U.S. government's request that he lift his temporary hold on President Obama's 2014 immigration actions. If he fails to do so by the end of next Monday, government lawyers are now saying they will bypass him and go straight to the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals with their request. Josh Gerstein has
the details.
“Absent a ruling by close of business on Monday, March 9, 2015, Defendants may seek relief from the Court of Appeals in order to protect their interests,” the DOJ lawyers wrote in their new submission.
Hanen could be tempted to think that the federal government is crying wolf, since back on Feb. 23, the Justice Department leveled a similar threat to proceed to the 5th Circuit if he didn’t rule on the stay by Feb. 25.
The government shouldn't hold its breath. Hanen, a Texas-based judge, has developed
a track record of not so favorable rulings regarding immigrants.
As we noted here, he may be too busy handling anti-immigrant cases from the likes of birther queen Orly Taitz to deal with requests from the U.S. government.
Immigrant rights groups have been pressuring the administration to act more aggressively in seeking to stay Hanen's order.
Some legal experts view the stay effort as a longshot, but activists fear that Obama’s immigration actions could lose momentum if they’re on hold for months or longer while an appeal plays out.
Hanen issued a preliminary injunction on Feb. 17 barring the administration from proceeding with an expansion of a deferred action program for illegal immigrants who arrived in the U.S. as children and with a new program for illegal immigrant parents of U.S. citizens or green card holders.
Hanen has not yet ruled on the merits of the GOP-led challenge to Obama's actions brought by 26 states. Rather, he temporarily blocked the program from moving forward because he said that it should have gone through a formal public comment period that the government often uses for major policy changes. Hanen did, however, express his skepticism that the program is constitutional—an indication of where his final ruling may be going.