Why is Obama allowed ‘executive discretion’ on immigration, but Trump isn't?

As House Democrats vote Tuesday to stop President Trump’s emergency declaration on the southern border, congressional Republicans should ask themselves: Why is it that every other president is permitted by courts to exercise “executive discretion,” and yet Trump isn’t? A New York Times report on Monday set up the scene for weak-willed Senate Republicans, writing that, “The [Democrat-controlled] House’s vote on a declaration of disapproval will force Republicans to choose between the congressional prerogative over federal spending established in the Constitution and a president determined to go around the legislative branch to secure funds for a border wall that Congress has refused to grant.”This is, on its face, a false choice, though some in the GOP are stupidly buying into it. Trump’s emergency declaration earlier this month does nothing more than free up little bits of money already allocated to the executive branch so that he can build more wall barriers on the border, stunting the overwhelming flood of illegal immigration from Latin America.
It’s every bit of a crisis today as it was when former President Barack Obama called it that in 2014, and the media happily played along. Trump’s official declaration only means he’s using his last option to address the issue. This isn’t an choice between fidelity to the Constitution or blind loyalty to a president; though I’ll note the executive branch is part of that newly appreciated document, and Congress has already given the president the authority to do exactly what Trump is pursuing. This is a choice about relinquishing authority to Democrats to set immigration policy even while a Republican president is in office...MORE