Former presidential adviser and political commentator Pat Buchanan ripped into House Speaker John Boehner, saying the Ohio Republican won't stop the president's amnesty plan for illegals because he's in the pocket of businesses that want it to move forward.
"John Boehner and those folks up in the Hill are going to follow the people that pay their room, board and tuition," Buchanan said Wednesday on "The Steve Malzberg Show" on
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"The business community doesn't want anything done. They would like to have the amnesty just go forward and have a little fulmination about it, but have that go forward and not fight on that front."
"That's what the Republican Party is going to do and it's going to go forward on that front."
That is, said Buchanan — a senior advisor to Presidents Nixon, Reagan and Ford — "unless and until people rise up inside the caucus and are able to take control and present the kind of battle plan that a lot of people think is needed."
This week, Boehner proposed a two-step plan to GOP lawmakers to curtail the executive action while avoiding a government shutdown.
The proposal would let House Republicans show they disapprove of amnesty while approving a federal spending bill to fund most of the government through next September.
The Department of Homeland Security, which handles immigration policy, would be funded only into March.
Buchanan believes the fate of the 2016 presidential race could depend on a strong GOP position on immigration.
"The idea if the Republican Party stands up for protecting our borders and we decide here in this country who comes in and who does not and when they do and when they don't, that candidate in the presidential primaries will go very, very far," he said.
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