Obama's sweeping immigration reforms blocked in 4-4 supreme court deadlock

Barack Obama has criticised a “heartbreaking” supreme court decision that will block legal recognition of 4 million long-stay immigrants, but insisted it was only a question of time before there was lasting reform.

Reacting to a tied supreme court ruling that effectively upholds lower-court opposition to his plan, the president said he would continue to instruct law enforcement officials not to prioritise the deportation of undocumented people who had lived in the US for more than five years.

But he acknowledged that successful Republican opposition through the courts would now make it hard for such families to seek the clearer legal status that his executive action had been intended to provide.

“Today’s decision is frustrating for those who seek to grow our economy, bring rationality to our immigration system and allow people to come out of the shadows and lift this perpetual cloud from them,” he said a hastily arranged statement to reporters at the White House.

“It is heartbreaking for the millions of immigrants who made their lives here, who raised families here, who hoped for the opportunity to work, pay taxes, serve in our military, and more fully contribute to this country in an open way.”

Instead Obama seized on the case – one that is exacerbated by congressional refusal to ratify his supreme court replacement for the recently deceased justice Antonin Scalia – as an example of what was at stake in November’s general election.

“Sooner or later immigration reform will get done,” he said. “Congress will not be able to ignore America forever. It’s not a matter of if, it’s a matter of when.”

Hillary Clinton also reacted quickly to the 4-4 split among remaining supreme court justices, citing it as an example of “just how high the stakes are in this election”.

“In addition to throwing millions of families across our country into a state of uncertainty, this decision reminds us how much damage Senate Republicans are doing by refusing to consider President Obama’s nominee to fill the vacancy on the supreme court,” she said.

But Republicans heralded the split decision as a victory for the checks and balances in the constitution.

“The supreme court’s decision that keeps in place the fifth circuit ruling is a win for the American people and especially American workers,” said Chuck Grassley, the judiciary committee chairman.

“It underscores the rule of law and the system of government set up by the founding fathers. I agree that our immigration system must be revamped, but circumventing Congress and attempting to rewrite the immigration laws simply because you don’t get your way is unlawful and contrary to the checks and balances so carefully crafted in the constitution.”

When it came, the court’s much-anticipated view on the immigration case was so succinct it was presented as single line of text: “The judgment is affirmed by an equally divided Court.”

The opinion represents a significant blow to Obama during his final months in office. It allows Republicans to claim victory in their argument that he overreached presidential powers and failed to protect America’s borders.

And it comes in an election year in which immigration has proven a bitterly divisive issue in the battle to succeed him.

The court had heard arguments in April over whether to revive Obama’s plan to spare roughly 4 million undocumented immigrants – those who have lived illegally in the US at least since 2010, have no criminal record and have children who are US citizens or lawful permanent residents – from mass deportations that would rip many families apart.

The president took the unilateral action after House Republicans thwarted bipartisan legislation providing a path to citizenship for illegal immigrants that was passed by the Senate in 2013.

But his executive action was challenged by 26 states, all of which are led by Republican governors (California, which has a significant immigrant population but is led by a Democratic governor, did not join). They argued that Obama had overreached and does not have the power to effectively change immigration law.

A federal judge in Texas ruled in their favour and the fifth US circuit court of appeals upheld that decision last November.

The supreme court’s 90-minute hearing in April considered the argument over the recent expansion of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) and the creation of Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (Dapa).

It noted the importance of a two-word phrase the administration used to describe the status of immigrants under the programmes: lawful presence. The states argued that it gives the immigrants more rights than federal law allows.

The hearing also illustrated the current 4-4 split between conservative and liberal justices on the court. Sonia Sotomayor and other liberals grilled Scott Keller, the solicitor general of Texas, while the conservative justices challenged the US solicitor general, Donald Verrilli, acting for the government.

Keller asserted that Dapa is an unprecedented unlawful assertion of executive power and one of the biggest changes in immigration policy in American history. Sotomayor fiercely disputed this.

The states also raised concerns that deferred action opens the way for immigrants to gain authorisation to work, eligibility for benefits and obtain driver’s licences with the financial burden that would entail in a state such as Texas.

Verrilli asserted the president’s authority to set priorities for immigration enforcement. But Justice Anthony Kennedy questioned whether the president can defer deportations for millions of people without congressional authorisation, saying “that is a legislative task, not an executive task”.

He added: “It’s as if the president is defining the policy and the Congress is executing it. That’s just upside down.”

The case has political purchase in an election year in which the presumptive Republican nominee, Donald Trump, has pledged to round up and deport all 11 million undocumented immigrants, described Mexican immigrants as “rapists” and promised to build a wall along the border.

Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee, said recently: “I strongly believe that these executive actions that are rooted in law and precedent will be upheld, but the fate of these policies, and of the millions of people who were impacted by them, will be in the hands of the next president.

“If Donald Trump is that president, he has pledged to eliminate Daca and Dapa on day one. He has said he will create a ‘deportation force’ to round up 11 million people. He will tear apart families, separate parents and children, rip young people out of school and workers from their jobs. He has even said he will undermine that most fundamental American value – that if you are born here, no matter who your parents are or where they came from, you are an American.”

Trump responded with a statement claiming the court ruling had blocked “one of the most unconstitutional actions ever undertaken by a president”.

He added: “The executive amnesty from President Obama wiped away the immigration rules written by Congress, giving work permits and entitlement benefits to people illegally in the country. This split decision also makes clear what is at stake in November. The election, and the Supreme Court appointments that come with it will decide whether or not we have a border and, hence, a country.”