Presidential spokesman links amnesty to 'heck of a fine'

Demonstrators protest against Arizona's controversial immigration law before marching to the State Capitol in Phoenix May 29, 2010. Angered by Arizona's crackdown on illegal immigrants, several thousand protesters descended on a park in central Phoenix early on Saturday, urging Washington to block the new state law they call racist. REUTERS/Joshua Lott (UNITED STATES - Tags: POLITICS SOCIETY CIVIL UNREST)

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs today joked that it would be a "heck of a fine" should the president decide to pardon some 10 million illegal aliens in the United States now.

He was responding to a question from Les Kinsolving, WND's correspondent at the White House, and the second-most-senior reporter on the beat.

Kinsolving asked, "Since eight members of the U.S. Senate – just two questions – since eight members of the U.S. Senate wrote the president strongly opposing the possibility of his using executive power to grant amnesty to more than 10 million illegal aliens in the U.S., is the president still planning to extend any such amnesty?"

Gibbs didn't answer, instead asking, "Through what means in that letter?"

Explained Kinsolving, "Well, he could pardon – he could pardon them, couldn't he?"

"But there are no pending 10 million pardon requests, Lester. I can clear that up," Gibbs said.

He did not address the possibility of parole or deferred action.

"What is the president's reaction …" Kinsolving started.

"It would be a heck of a fine," interrupted Gibbs.

"To the unanimous jury decision in the U.S. District Court for eastern Pennsylvania in support of the Boy Scouts and against the Philadelphia City Council who tried to bar them from their longtime headquarters?" Kinsolving finished.

"You're going to find this surprising, but I'm not aware of the details of the case," Gibbs said.

"It was widely reported," Kinsolving said.

"It missed my desk. It missed my desk," said Gibbs.

On the issue of amnesty, WND reported earlier about the letter from eight Republican senators.

"There's a lot we can agree on when it comes to dealing with the immigration problems in the United States, but this appears to be amnesty in disguise, and is simply an attempt to circumvent Congress," Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a statement.

Grassley and Sens. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah; Saxby Chambliss, R-Ga.; David Vitter, R-La.; Jim Bunning, R-Ky.; James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Thad Cochran, R-Miss.; and Johnny Isakson, R-Ga., signed a letter to the president dated June 21.

"We understand that there's a push for your administration to develop a plan to unilaterally extend either deferred action or parole to millions of illegal aliens in the United States," they wrote in their letter. "We understand that the administration may include aliens who have willfully overstayed their visas or filed for benefits knowing that they will not be eligible for a status for years to come."

"Deferred action" is granted by the Department of Homeland Security. It's a short-term suspension of deportation hearings for illegal aliens. With "deferred action," illegals are often allowed to apply for employment-authorization cards.

The lawmakers noted that "deferred action" and parole are discretionary actions reserved for "individual cases that present unusual, emergent or humanitarian circumstances."

"Deferred action and parole were not intended to be used to confer a status or offer protection to large groups of illegal aliens, even if the agency claims that they look at each case on a 'case-by-case' basis," they wrote.

The senators agreed that the nation's immigration laws "need to be fixed," but they added, "While deferred action and parole are executive-branch authorities, they should not be used to circumvent Congress' constitutional authority to legislate immigration policy, particularly as it relates to the illegal population in the United States."

Urging Obama for assurance that he has no plans to use either authority, the senators requested that he clarify the administration's intentions immediately.

"The Administration would be wise to abandon any plans for deferred action or parole for the illegal population," they wrote. "Such a move would further erode the American public's confidence in the federal government and its commitment to securing the borders and enforcing the laws already on the books."

As WND reported, former Obama adviser and Service Employees International Union executive vice president Eliseo Medina explained that granting citizenship to millions of illegal aliens would expand the "progressive" electorate and help ensure a "progressive" governing coalition for the long term.

"We reform the immigration laws, it puts 12 million people on the path to citizenship and eventually voters," Medina said during his speech at a June 2009 Washington conference for the liberal America's Future Now!

Medina said that during the presidential election in November 2008, Latinos and immigrants "voted overwhelmingly for progressive candidates. Barack Obama got two out of every three voters that showed up."

"Can you imagine if we have, even the same ratio, two out of three? Can you imagine 8 million new voters who care about our issues and will be voting? We will be creating a governing coalition for the long term, not just for an election cycle."

In the Boy Scout case, a federal jury decided Philadelphia violated the Boy Scouts' First Amendment rights by using the organization's policy that prohibits homosexuals from acting as leaders of young boys as a reason to evict them from their city-owned offices near Logan Square.

"We can't be kicked out of the building or evicted and we don't have to pay any rent," Scouts' attorney William M. McSwain said after the unanimous verdict by a jury of six women and two men.

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