U.S. States Sue Obama over Immigration Reform

Texas led a group of 17 U.S. states Wednesday in suing President Barack Obama's administration over its plan to offer up to five million undocumented migrants protection from deportation.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott said Obama's unilateral immigration reform plans, unveiled last month to bypass Congressional gridlock by Republicans, "tramples" on the U.S. constitution.

"The president is abdicating his responsibility to faithfully enforce laws that were duly enacted by Congress and attempting to rewrite immigration laws, which he has no authority to do," Abbott, who filed the lawsuit, said in a statement.

He said Obama's move "tramples the U.S. Constitution's Take Care Clause," which limits the president's power and ensures he will faithfully execute Congress's laws -- "not rewrite them under the guise of ‘prosecutorial discretion.'"

Obama's controversial overhaul provides three-year relief for millions of undocumented people who have lived in the country for more than five years and have children that are U.S. citizens or legal residents.

According to the president, it also channels more resources to the U.S. border with Mexico and shifts deportation priorities toward expelling felons.

But critics blasted the action as "illegal" and "unconstitutional" as soon as Obama unveiled it.

Vice President Joe Biden warned this week that Republicans would be making a "mistake" if they use last-minute budget negotiations this month as leverage against the White House's controversial immigration order.

U.S. lawmakers must strike a spending deal by December 11 in order to avoid a government shutdown, which would begin the following day if Congress does not act.