Hillary Clinton said the Supreme Court's decision on immigration that left a lower court ruling in place was unacceptable. | Getty Clinton: Supreme Court 'unacceptable' on immigration ruling

The deadlocked Supreme Court decision derailing President Barack Obama’s executive actions on immigration is “unacceptable,” Hillary Clinton said Thursday, leading a chorus of Democrats condemning the tie.

The high court split 4-4 Thursday morning, leaving in place a lower court ruling preventing the president from launching a new program that would grant “deferred action” status to undocumented immigrants who are parents of U.S. citizens or green card holders.


Clinton argued that the ruling was “purely procedural and casts no doubt” on the fact that Obama’s actions are within his legal authority and vowed to introduce comprehensive immigration reform with a path to citizenship within the first 100 days of her administration. But she also stressed that the impact of the split decision, made possible by a vacancy on the high court, shows 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,” Clinton said in a statement. “Our families and our country need and deserve a full bench, and Senate Republicans need to stop playing political games with our democracy and give Judge Merrick Garland a fair hearing and vote.”

The decision is also a reminder of “the harm Donald Trump would do to our families,” added Clinton, who maintained that America is stronger together, embracing, not denigrating, immigrants and building walls, not bridges.

“Trump has pledged to repeal President Obama’s executive actions on his first day in office,” Clinton said. “He has called Mexican immigrants ‘rapists’ and ‘murderers.’ He has called for creating a deportation force” to tear 11 million people away from their families and their homes. I believe we are stronger together.”

Trump weighed in hours later on Twitter, writing, "SC has kept us safe from exec amnesty--for now. But Hillary has pledged to expand it, taking jobs from Hispanic & African-American workers."

The ruling yet again injects the Supreme Court vacancy into the presidential election discussion. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders similarly warned against electing Trump and urged Republicans to “stop playing politics” with its inaction on Garland’s confirmation.

“Today's deadlocked immigration ruling means that more than 4 million aspiring Americans in the United States will be left waiting for much-needed answers to our broken immigration system,” Sanders said in a statement. “We cannot let their future, and the future of so many more vulnerable people, fall into the bigoted hands of Donald Trump.”

Delivering a statement from the White House, Obama said congressional and presidential candidates will debate the issue of the Supreme Court and immigration, among others, and Americans will face a choice in November about what they care about and who they are.

“I promise you this, though, sooner or later immigration reform will get done. Congress is not gonna be able to ignore America forever,” Obama said. “It’s not a matter of if. It’s a matter of when.”

Republicans haven’t wavered in their refusal to grant Garland a hearing, an issue Democrats have hammered GOP officials seeking reelection on and one in which Clinton and Trump have seized on as another reason their party shouldn’t allow the opposing candidate to win the White House, stressing that the next president could appoint multiple justices.

Obama blamed the split decision as “part of a consequence of the Republican failure” to give Garland a fair hearing.

“The fact that the Supreme Court wasn’t able to issue a decision today doesn’t just set the system back even further,” he added. “It takes us further from the country that we aspire to be.”

Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) called for a re-hearing once the court is full. He said he was “extremely disappointed” by split but also noted that the court didn’t rule Obama’s actions unconstitutional.

“It highlighted how a hobbled Supreme Court is unable to provide justice to the American people. It showcased the need for a fully functioning Supreme Court and for Republicans to move without delay on the nomination of Judge Merrick Garland,” Reid said in a statement. “Until that happens, this commonsense program will remain blocked and millions of families will continue to live in constant fear of losing a loved one to deportation.”

Democratic National Committee Chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz blasted Republicans in a blistering statement that said “the Republican Party is no longer a functioning political party” but rather a party that is “singularly focused on grinding government to a halt, and cannot be trusted to lead.”

“This is what the Republican vision of smaller government looks like: a government so small and dysfunctional that the Republican-led Senate can force an entire branch of our federal government, which is supposed to be separate and equal, to deadlock on a critical ruling that affects millions,” the Florida representative said.

Republicans, however, celebrated the ruling as a win for the preservation of the separation of powers.

“Today, Article I of the Constitution was vindicated,” House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) said in a statement. “The Supreme Court’s ruling makes the president’s executive action on immigration null and voice. The Constitution is clear: The president is not permitted to write laws—only Congress. This is another major victory in our fight to restore the separation of powers.”

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy slammed Obama’s “executive order granting de facto amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants” but added that the court “made the right call.”

“The court system took the President’s own words into account that such an action would ‘violate our laws’ and be ‘very difficult to defend legally,’” McCarthy said in a statement. “Today, the Supreme Court made the right call. When Congress doesn’t give the President what he wants, the President doesn’t all the sudden gain the right to legislate all by himself.”

Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions, Trump's highest-profile supporter in the Senate, signaled in a lengthy statement that the fight isn’t yet over, though.

“The case now will be sent back for additional litigation on the merits of the case, and the ultimate outcome remains uncertain,” he explained. “What is clear, as highlighted by the egregious unethical conduct by the Department of Justice lawyers, in this case, is that this Administration will stop at nothing to forge ahead with its lawless plans – which arguably have already caused substantial damage to the integrity of our immigration system.”

Arizona Sen John McCain said immigration must be debated and determined by representatives of the people and called for bipartisan cooperation to fix America’s immigration system. But he, too, praised the decision.

“The Supreme Court ruling today affirms that the president’s unilateral actions, which have marked his lame-duck term, will not stand,” he said in a statement. “This decision further emphasizes that the president cannot rewrite the laws he finds problematic, nor skirt the separation of powers whenever he finds it convenient.”

Retired neurosurgeon and former Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson said he anticipated the decision and also expressed a desire to see Congress, not the White House, act on immigration reform.

“One of the things I think is so important for us to recognize is that immigration law is supposed to be determined by the people through their representatives, not necessarily through the president,” he told MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell. “So in a way this is not a terribly bad thing to have occurred, but hopefully the people's representatives will in fact deal with it.”

Trump surrogate and former Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer said the decision is a reminder to Obama that he is an elected official, not a “tyrannical king who is above the law.”

“President Obama's illegal and unconstitutional executive orders on immigration were struck down,” she wrote in a Facebook post. “His blatant disregard for the rule of law and purposeful failure to secure our borders is a disgrace. Americans want a secure border first--not amnesty for millions of illegal aliens!”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott cheered in a Facebook post that “Obama’s executive amnesty remains BLOCKED after Supreme Court tie!” Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton echoed Ryan’s sentiments, releasing a statement that called the ruling a “major setback” for Obama but also a “victory for those who believe in the separation of powers and the rule of law.”

“Today’s decision keeps in place what we have maintained from the very start: one person, even a president, cannot unilaterally change the law,” he said.

Tyler Pager contributed to this report.