White House Fuzzy on Timing of Obama's Executive Amnesty

by Charlie Spiering

President Obama insists that he still plans to make an executive decision on immigration reform, but his timeline for action grows increasingly convoluted.

Obama and his team spent most of the summer previewing his executive action on immigration reform, vowing to fix what they describe as a “broken immigration system” without Congress as soon as possible.
"I expect their recommendations before the end of summer, and I intend to adopt those recommendations without further delay," Obama explained in June, referring to a requested proposal from Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson.
But since then, White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest won't clarify the timing of Obama’s executive action.



Recent reports in Politico and the L.A.Times cite internal discussions in the White House on the timing of the decision, which may be delayed until after the mid-term elections in November.
Now it is unclear whether Obama does plan to act by the end of the summer.
“I would anticipate that, by the time the end of summer rolls around, the president will have received those final recommendations; but in terms of when he will act on those final recommendations, I don’t have any guidance for you at this point,” White House Press Secretary Earnest said when pressed by reporters at the press briefing this afternoon.
As reporters continued to press Earnest about the timing, he grew frustrated, insisting that Obama was still committed to act alone on immigration.
“Humbly, let me suggest to you that the substance of the action is more important than the timing,” he said. “At this point, the lack of clarity around timing should not in any way lead people to believe that there is any lack of clarity by the president's commitment to acting on this priority.”