Immigration has been an issue that has been hotly contested at the national level, and when President Barack Obama told a nationwide audience that he was going to use Executive Action to address the immigration problem, he was met with a considerable backlash from Republicans.  Of note, Speaker of the House Rep. John Boehner (R-Ohio) called out the president for doing something that he previously said was something that couldn't be tackled with Executive Action.  In a national television interview, Speaker Boehner said this:

On immigration, "the president said 22 times, 22 times, that he couldn't do what he eventually did."

Our partners at PolitiFact took a look into Boehner's claim to see how accurate it was.  PolitiFact reporter Joshua Gillin says that Speaker Boehner's claim rates MOSTLY TRUE on the Truth-O-Meter.  Gillin says that, for the most part, Boehner is on the money with his statement.

We took a list that Boehner supplied and compared it to a list that PolitiFact Texas had compiled, and yes, it included 22 items," said Gillin.  "They're sort of splitting hairs with some of the semantics from what President Obama was saying, but the overall essence of the claim is is accurate.  President Obama did go out and say over and over that he didn't have the authority to issue an Executive Action to deal with immigration.  As we all know, that abruptly changed this past November."

Gillin notes that a few of the 22 items listed by Boehner were a bit problematic, because the President wasn't as specific as in other statements.  "A few times, President Obama said things along the lines of that he 'couldn't ignore the laws that were out there,'" said Gillin.  "Although the President was talking about immigration, there was no clear-cut statement saying that he would not use Executive Action to resolve the matter."

Gillin says that seven of the 22 statements are vague enough that they can't be counted in Boehner's favor, but that doesn't change the general direction of Boehner's position, which leads PolitiFact to give him a MOSTLY TRUE rating on the Truth-O-Meter.

 

SOURCES: Obama and Executive Action on immigration?