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Washington • House Republicans on Thursday voted for legislation that would retroactively jettison President Barack Obama's executive orders on immigration while also considering the possibility of using budget negotiations to make a stronger push against the White House.
The House passed a measure 219-197 that would prohibit the executive branch from exempting, by executive order, any laws against deporting immigrants in the country unlawfully, though the bill is unlikely to get a vote in the Democrat-led Senate and Obama would likely veto it anyway.
"Rather than deport students and separate families and make it harder for law enforcement to do its job, I just want the Congress to work with us to pass a common-sense law to fix that broken immigration system," Obama said ahead of the vote.
The two Utah Republican House members present for the vote — Reps. Jason Chaffetz and Chris Stewart — voted for the legislation. The state's lone Democrat in Congress, Rep. Jim Matheson, opposed it.
While mainly symbolic, the bill was aimed at giving conservative members of Congress an opportunity to vent their frustrations, though it may not be enough to stop a budget fight next week.
"I'd like to do a lot more but I think this was the right move for the moment," said Chaffetz.
The federal budget expires next Thursday, and while Congress is poised to approve a stopgap measure to keep the government running, there are several conservative members eyeing the budget renewal as an opportunity to force Obama's retreat on his executive orders that bar the removal of hundreds of thousands of immigrants in the country without proper documentation.
Thousands of those families reside in Utah.
In fact, a recent study said the Beehive State has a higher percentage of undocumented immigrants that could benefit from Obama's executive orders than any other state.
The Migration Policy Institute estimated that 55 percent of the undocumented population in Utah could be shielded from deportation through his action, or about 48,000 people. That is higher than the percentages in Texas or California.
The House could attempt to pass a funding bill for the Homeland Security Department that forbids using money to enforce Obama's executive orders.
"I didn't come back here to just play games," said Rep. Matt Salmon, R-Ariz. "Our voters who sent us back here in a resounding way in the majority, and retaking the majority in the Senate, expected us to be a little more forceful in our fight."
Chaffetz agrees.
"I don't want a shutdown; I don't even want to entertain a discussion about a shutdown," the Utah Republican told The Tribune in an interview Thursday. "What the president did was fundamentally and totally wrong and we have a role to play in that and we can't just let this go into the night. It's a terrible precedent and it's bad public policy. I think we should look at every vehicle as a potential way to do what we think is right."
Mindful of the backlash from last year's government shutdown, House leaders have been attempting to craft a short-term budget measure that could gain support from rank-and-file Republicans to keep the federal government funded through the new year, but up to 40 members have reportedly signaled that may not be enough in the wake of Obama's actions.
Some have even suggested more creative ways to hamstring Obama over executive orders.
Rep. Paul Broun, R-Ga., called for House Speaker John Boehner not to invite the president to give the annual State of the Union in the House chamber while Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan., tossed out the idea of cutting the budgets for White House operations, including Air Force One, according to The Washington Post.
Chaffetz says those last two ideas aren't something he'd support but there are a number of ways in which the GOP can use its authority to push back.
"Some of them are a bit silly and absurd but I hate to cut off any of the possibilities," he said.
Stewart, who represents Utah's 2nd Congressional District, including Salt Lake City, said support of the Executive Amnesty Prevention Act of 2014, was important to reaffirm the roles of the legislative and executive branches.
"The Constitution is clear — it's Congress' responsibility to write the law and the president's job is to simply enforce those laws," Stewart said. "We must prevent President Obama, and future presidents, from abusing their authority through immigration executive orders. This bill does just that."
Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, wasn't able to make the vote, but his office said he supported the measure.
The Associated Press contributed to this story