Immigration Crackdown: U.S. senators call for probe into immigration dismissals

We are not sympathetic to the way President Obama is handling the immigration issue, but we do see that the Republicans get him both coming and going. On the one hand, he is portrayed as failing to "secure the border," despite deploying record Border Patrol forces and other military resources and deporting record numbers of "illegal" immigrants. On the other hand, he is attacked for having the Homeland Security Department recommend dismissals of deportation cases not involving serious criminal charges, in order to not over-burden the courts.

U.S. senators call for probe into immigration dismissals | Immigration | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle:
"The seven Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday called for an investigation into the dismissal of hundreds of immigration cases in Houston, accusing Homeland Security officials of selectively enforcing the law.

In early August, Homeland Security trial attorneys started filing unsolicited motions to dismiss hundreds of cases on Houston's immigration court docket involving suspected illegal immigrants who have lived in the U.S. for more than two years without committing serious crimes.

News of the dismissals, first reported in the Houston Chronicle in late August, caused a national controversy amid allegations that the Obama administration was implementing a kind of "backdoor amnesty" — a charge officials strongly denied." Oct. 22, 2010