Is Obama Exceeding His Presidential Power With New Immigration Policy?

President Obama announced earlier this week that he would bypass Congress — House Republicans are reportedly refusing to vote on the bill — and make his own changes. "They're unwilling to stand up to the Tea Party and do what's right for the country. And what's worse — a bunch of them know better," said Obama in the Rose Garden, where he was joined by Vice President Joe Biden, reports the Business Insider. He further cited that he could take executive actions without Congress and would be making changes by the end of the summer.

Since last fall, there has been a large influx of Central Americans in Mexico and the United States. More specifically, over 50,000 unaccompanied minors from South America (namely El Salvador, Guatemala and the Honduras) have been detained while attempting to illegally cross over to the United States. Government officials are reporting that most of the children hail from Mexico and Central America, and are coming to the United States to flee poor economies, violence, or to be reunited with their families.

In fact, according to the Pew Research Center, since last October, the U.S. Customs and Border Protection records taking into custody 47,017 unaccompanied children under the age of 18. The data is shocking considering that the first four months of 2014 have had more apprehensions than in the entire 2013 fiscal year, which had 24,493 apprehensions. Given the current rate, some estimates predict four times as many arrests this year than last year.

"Depending on how far they go, yes," said David Martin, a professor at the University of Virginia School of Law who specializes in immigration law, to Business Insider. "It could be a significant challenge to the scope of presidential power."

While politicians are debating many sides of the crisis, the Public Religion Research Institute conducted a survey to poll Americans and see what their views are on the child migration crisis. Namely, people were polled to see if the immigrant children be deported or provided refuge in America. The findings were surprising and clear — regardless of political affiliation or religion, most Americans were sympathetic towards the children and felt the United States should review each case instead of deporting children immediately.

Specifically, 80 percent of Democrats, 69 percent of independents and 57 percent of Republicans were in favor of the government reviewing each case and not deporting children immediately. Within the different religious groups, 56 percent of white evangelical Protestants, 57 percent of white mainline Protestants, 74 percent of minority Protestants, 75 percent of Catholics and 75 percent of those without religious affiliations were sympathetic towards the child immigrants.