Obama Chooses Iran Over The Constitution

Another week, another unconstitutional action on the part of President Barack Obama. He always fails us! But this week’s episode of “Obama’s Constitutional Violation” features none other than the administration’s favorite state sponsor of terrorism: Iran.

In addition to unilaterally rolling back part of the Immigration and Nationality Act with the stroke of a pen, reinterpreting the Brady Bill against the will of Congress, and overriding congressional immigration caps via executive order, now the President will implement a new visa waiver program despite Congress previously rejecting this very idea – all to appease his newfound Iranian ally.

Yes, that’s right, let me articulate that one more time – in implementing a new visa waiver program, Obama opted to implement the will of Iran over the will of Congress. Pause and consider that for a moment. Let the bewilderment set in.

Last year, Congress passed a bipartisan visa waiver bill designed to close a loophole that could permit Europeans involved with ISIS to enter the United States. As the Hill reports, “All of the attackers involved in the Paris violence are believed to have been European nationals, meaning they likely would have been able to travel to the U.S. without a visa.”

The new bill barred citizens from 38 countries from entering the U.S. without a visa if they had visited Iran, Iraq, Syria or Sudan since March 2011. It also prohibited dual nationals from these four countries from entering without a visa. Included in this bill was a limited waiver option, permitting the President to waive the visa requirement if travel was “in the law enforcement or national security interests of the United States.” President Obama signed this bill into law.

Despite both parties signing on to these protective changes, not everyone was happy, namely the Iranian government. Iranian leaders involved in the poorly negotiated Iran deal demanded that the President repeal these barriers to entering the United States.

As we all know, when the Ayatollah ain’t happy, no one’s happy.

To appease its newly minted ally, Barack Obama’s loyal foot soldier at the State Department, Secretary John Kerry, sent word to the Iranian government that visa restrictions could be easily overcome via the waiver provision.

The Iranian malcontents had made their position known, and so too did a group of congressmen who wrote this to both the State Department and the Department of Homeland Security:

We are deeply concerned that the narrowly intended use of the waiver authority will be ignored in favor of applying the waiver authority to those who have traveled to Iran for business purposes. Not only was such an exemption from the law not included in the legislation, it was specifically discussed during bill negotiations with [Obama] administration staff and expressly refused by members of Congress.

At this point, a Constitution-abiding President would defer to the will of Congress — but no, the interest of Iran inexplicably trumped the interests of Congress and constitutional adherence.

In the face of congressional protest, the Department of Homeland Security, one month later, announced changes to the visa waiver program, creating a carve-out solely for Iran and also permitting dual nationals and those who have traveled to the four terror hotspots to attain a waiver on a case-by-case basis if they are coming for “legitimate business-related purposes.” Never mind the statutory waiver is for “law enforcement or national security interests,” not “legitimate business-related purposes.”

Obama’s DHS acted in direct contravention of the statute by ignoring the plain language of the law and trampling on the will of Congress, which had expressly rejected just such a waiver.

Congressional backlash was rightfully strong in the aftermath of DHS’s announcement. The Chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, Congressman Bob Goodlatte, said:

The Obama Administration is essentially rewriting the law by blowing wide open a small window of discretion that Congress gave it for law enforcement and national security reasons. In fact, the categories of people that the Obama Administration is exempting from the law were expressly rejected by Congress.

Nevertheless, the will of Iran won the day, and the Constitution was ignored, as it so often is under this presidency.

With each recurrent unconstitutional action, it has become increasingly clear that the President finds the Constitution of the United States to be an annoyance, a pesky roadblock to his progressive agenda. Rather than adhering to it, Obama is hell-bent on working around it or actively thwarting it.

Congress is a thorn in his side and so too is the document prescribing separation of powers. After all, for Obama, the Constitution is nothing more than an ancient relic, meticulously crafted by a group of men whose intellect could never match that of our great leader – a Harvard Law graduate and constitutional law lecturer whose faculty lounge musings were matched by no one.

We often hear liberal nonsense about the Constitution being a living, breathing document, but whatever constitutional philosophy you may ascribe to, there is one thing the Constitution is not: a blank page. Far from being a blank page, our founding document was designed to stop historical tyrants like King George III and modern day executives like President Barack Obama.

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Kayleigh McEnany is a conservative writer and commentator who appears regularly on Fox and CNN. She is currently in the third year of pursuing her J.D. at Harvard Law School. Kayleigh graduated from Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service and also studied politics at Oxford University. You can reach her by email at [email protected] or follow her on Twitter: @kayleighmcenany.