“Listen, there’s widespread doubt about whether this administration can be trusted to enforce our laws,” he told a press conference. “And it’s going to be difficult to move any immigration legislation until that changes.”

Let us consider the Obama administration’s record on enforcing immigration laws. Under this president, half of all federal crime prosecution involves immigration crime. The government now spends more on enforcing immigration laws than it spends on the F.B.I., Drug Enforcement Administration, Secret Service, U.S. Marshals Service and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives combined.

We have more than 650 miles of fencing along the Mexican border. Plus, don’t forget all the drones. And 21,391 border patrol agents. Given the plummeting numbers of people actually trying to illegally cross into the country, let us hope that a lot of those agents are good at meditation.

A sizable chunk of Obama’s own base is furious over the all-time high rate of deportations — nearly two million so far in his tenure and way ahead of the record of George W. Bush. The government now automatically goes through the fingerprints of people who are arrested and sifts out the ones who are here illegally.

Immigrant advocates say the system breaks up families and viciously punishes people who may be guilty of nothing more than a minor traffic violation. The administration says it’s all about targeting the real criminals. This is an argument we need to continue, but, however it turns out, the answer is not going to be that Barack Obama refused to enforce the immigration laws.

So what do you think John Boehner’s real motive is for dropping immigration reform? Do you think his members are worried that if illegal immigrants get a path to citizenship, they’ll use their franchise to vote Democratic? (“G.O.P. Crafts Plan to Wreck the Country, Lose Voters,” said the headline in a blog from the ever-popular Ann Coulter.)

Maybe the House is just short of time. There’s a post office somewhere that needs renaming, and Obamacare to repeal.