January 26, 2015
Carson City, NV - Nevada Attorney General Adam Paul Laxalt issued the following statement after Nevada joined a majority of the States in a legal action challenging the President’s unilateral executive action on immigration:
“Our immigration system is broken and clearly needs to be fixed. But just as clearly, the solution is not for the President to act unilaterally disregarding the U.S. Constitution and laws. The solution must be a permanent, legal result that includes, not ignores, the other branches of government and their constitutional roles. Anything less is a false hope undermining the rule of law that injures millions of people in America, including many in Nevada.
“As Nevada’s chief legal officer, I am directed by Nevada’s Constitution and laws to take legal action whenever necessary ‘to protect and secure the interest of the State. Unfortunately, just as a majority of our sister states have concluded, it is necessary to challenge the President’s unilateral action to protect the rule of law and ensure that sweeping federal requirements that directly impact Nevada have been properly enacted. The President cannot bypass the peoples’ elected representatives in Congress just because they do not pass the laws he wants, nor can he simply rewrite current law under the guise of ‘prosecutorial discretion’.”
The States’ case is currently pending in Federal District Court in the Southern District of Texas. In addition to Nevada, the states represented in the suit include: Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
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