Let the Amnesty begin.

"The Obama administration has begun approving young illegal immigrants' requests to stay in the country under President Barack Obama's deferred action program, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Tuesday," Jen Epstein of Politico reports this week.

"Three months after Obama announced the program and one month after the department began taking applications, more than 72,000 people have made requests for two years of deferred action - which can be renewed - and a work permit.”

President Obama’s backdoor Amnesty program is causing a meltdown in our nation’s efforts to secure our borders.  As crazy as it sounds, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are actually being threatened with disciplinary action by their superiors for…enforcing our immigration laws!

• In El Paso, two ICE agents doing an inmate screening discovered an ILLEGAL alien who had been arrested for domestic assault. The ILLEGAL alien assaulted an officer while trying to escape. Then amazingly he was released according to Obama’s order -- and the two ICE officers were questioned for possible disciplinary action.

• An ICE agent in Delaware was threatened with suspension if he didn’t release an ILLEGAL alien caught during a criminal investigation who had 10 prior traffic violations.

• Ten ICE agents have now filed a lawsuit against Obama’s Amnesty -- including the president of the ICE union -- because it forces them to either violate the law or face disciplinary action.

Though the law says illegal aliens are to be held, the president is telling ICE agents to ignore the law.  He is claiming the power to decide America’s immigration policy without the consent of Congress or the American people.

Obama’s goal is to create a de facto Amnesty for illegal immigrants by not enforcing the law…then bully us later into submitting to his wishes to make them citizens.

The president’s disregard for our laws and our Constitution must be stopped.  That’s why it’s so important that Congress pass the HALT Act (HR 2497) - “Hinder the Administration’s Legalization Temptation” - sponsored by Rep. Lamar Smith.

“DHS’s plan to open the door to mass administrative amnesty is a rejection of Congress’ constitutional rights and shows utter disdain towards the wishes of the American people,” Smith explained in a July hearing on the HALT Act.

The HALT Act would stop the president’s backdoor Amnesty effort dead in its tracks by cutting off funding, and Citizen Outreach has set up an online micro-site (http://bit.ly/QIUehM) where people can add their name to the list of supporters.

It’s one thing not to agree with the nation’s current laws; it’s another thing altogether not to enforce laws you don’t like or change them without going through Congress.  The president’s effort in this regard must be HALTed.