Texas Gov. Abbott on Deportations: Trump Is Enforcing Laws that Are Already on the Books

EXCERPT:

ABBOTT: "So, to get into the way the law works, Joe, and that is, first, as you pointed, I used to be a Supreme Court justice and then the attorney general of Texas. I’ve litigated these issues quite frequently. And a lot of people in the business world, they forget the way the Constitution was constructed. And that is, there’s the separation of powers. The executive branch has the authority that can operate independently of the legislative and the judicial branches. And as — you gotta look into the bowels of the details of it to see whether or not that is a pure separation here. But what the Trump Administration is saying is that they have the independent authority that cannot be overridden by the judicial branch or by the legislative branch to execute these laws. Remember, what Trump is doing, he’s just not saying, 'Well, we’re going to do this because we want to do it.' Trump is enforcing laws that are already on the book, and that’s exactly what the Constitution requires the executive branch to do."
QUICK: "But isn’t there an interpretation of the law that the courts are responsible for?"