The Obama Administration today asked a federal judge in Texas to end his temporary injunction against the President's executive actions on immigration, arguing to leave that in place would cause "irreparable harm" to the United States Government.
"Allowing the preliminary injunction to remain in place pending appeal would also harm the interests of the public and of third parties, who will be deprived of the significant law enforcement and humanitarian benefits," the Department of Justice argued in its request for an emergency stay.
Credit: Jamie Dupree
Credit: Jamie Dupree
A spokesman for the Department of Justice, Brian Fallon, said if the Texas judge does nothing by Wednesday, then the feds may move up to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.
You can read the entire filing today by the Justice Department here.
Senate still deadlocked on immigration
While the legal battle escalates over the executive actions by the President, Congress is still trying to figure out what's next in the political fight over not only the immigration changes, but also funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
On Monday, Democrats blocked the start of debate on a House-passed bill for a fourth time, as the votes haven't changed on the issue in the last three weeks.
GOP Senators said after the vote that it's not time to give in, even with the threat of a shutdown at the end of this week for the Department of Homeland Security.
"I think we're on the right side of this issue," said Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK). "We ought to stick with it and not worry so much about who is going to get the blame."
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell last night started to set up a vote later this week on a plan that would roll back the President's immigration actions - not tied to the budget for homeland defense.
It wasn't immediately clear if that would provide some way forward to break the current deadlock on the issue in the Senate, as Democrats denounced the plan.
Republicans though want to force Democrats to go on the record about the President's executive actions, which so far, they have been able to avoid doing.
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