Obama's immigration action divides Minn. delegation

President Barack Obama will address the nation tonight to announce an executive action that could allow 5 million unauthorized immigrants to remain in the United States without fear of deportation.

In doing so, he will set in motion a bruising Congressional battle that has been two years in the making, one that will draw Minnesota's delegation into the fray.

Although the Senate passed a bipartisan immigration overhaul in the spring of 2013, one that Democratic U.S. Sen. Al Franken helped craft in the Judiciary Committee, immigration hardliners in the House blocked all efforts to pass a bill. Efforts by departing Republican U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann of Minnesota' 6th District and others led to many of the Senate bill's Republican supporters to reverse themselves.

• More: What is an executive action?

In light of the president's action, Bachmann and her allies want to use a must-pass government spending bill to defund the immigration initiative — a fight that could result in a government shutdown.

"This is about altering, fundamentally, the social contract between our government and the American people," said Bachmann, who, like other Republicans, considers the president's action unlawful.

With memories of last year's shutdown in mind, Republican U.S. Rep. John Kline and other House GOP leaders are warning against such a move. It would create the kind of ill will that would make progress on other fronts difficult, he said.

"But I also think it's important that we clear the table of as many things as we can here in the lame duck and that would include providing funding for the government through the end of September," said Kline, who represents Minnesota's 2nd District.

Kline, who chairs the Education Committee, wants to work with the administration to rewrite the 2002 No Child Left Behind law next year.

But he has warned U.S. Education Secretary Arne Duncan that if the administration acts on its own on immigration all bets are off.

"I think it makes it tougher for us to work on other issues," Kline said.

Some Democrats, including U.S. Rep. Tim Walz of Minnesota's 1st District, say Republicans aren't being sincere about cooperation given their track record.

"The well was poisoned by not bringing it forward when we waited 18 months after the Senate passed a bipartisan bill," Walz said.

Many in his party are happy about President Obama's move, among them U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison of Minnesota's 5th District.

"It's going to unite families," Ellison said of he executive action. "It's responsive government and maybe it would prompt the Congress to actually put something on the floor that we can vote on."

Walz, however, would rather the president give Congress one more chance to act on immigration rather than provoke Republicans with executive actions.

"Give us just a bit of time here, see if there is going to be anything," Walz said. "And I know people who are ... saying they're not going to do anything. Well, we've waited 18 months, we could wait a couple weeks more, see if we get it and then move forward."

But neither Walz's nor Kline's factions of their respective parties appears likely to prevail. With the president poised to issue an executive action, Bachmann is using her final weeks in office to rally the conservative grassroots with some pretty strong claims about the president's intentions.

"He's looking at new voters for 2016," Bachmann said. "Even though the president says they won't be able to vote, we all know that many in all likelihood will actually be able to vote."

There's no evidence that's true. The action does not include a path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants.

Bachmann also thinks U.S. taxpayers will be burdened with the "social costs" of "unskilled, illiterate foreign nationals coming into the United States who can't speak the English language."

She later insisted that she was not using a pejorative term, but merely repeating what U.S. Hispanics who live near the U.S.-Mexico border told her.

One bipartisan point of agreement is that Obama's actions are big and dramatic.

Ellison said presidents often have been compelled to take action on behalf of the powerless by a divided Congress. The executive action, Ellison said, will make a big difference for the people affected.

"It was President Truman who issued an executive order to end discrimination in the U.S. military," he said. "The Emancipation Proclamation is an executive order. Presidents have taken bold steps in the past when Congress wouldn't act."