Louie Gohmert: Refugees steal 'dreams' of Americans, and are 'a threat to our existence'

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) warned this week that the dreams of Americans might not come true as long as refugees fleeing violence in Central America were allowed stay in the U.S.

At a press conference on Tuesday, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) introduced his bill to strip any additional funding from going to President Barack Obama's Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, which halted the deportations of undocumented immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children.

"All across America there are young children, just like we were that had dreams... there are kids, there are adults with dreams," Gohmert explained at the press conference. "And adults have lost jobs right and left, including in our military."

The Tea Party-backed Republican pointed out that the unemployment rate for African-Americans was nearly double the national average.

"Those people have dreams," he said. "What about their dreams? You can't achieve you dreams when you have a president of the United States that's being lawless, and when you have a southern border that's subjecting the United States to the kind of lawlessness that we see down there."

Gohmert asserted that drug cartels were bringing refugees to the U.S. and forcing them to work to pay off debts.

"It's time to stop helping the drug cartels and hurting the dreams of African-Americans, Hispanic-Americans -- for Heaven sakes -- all Americans," he declared. "Enough lawlessness, Mr. President, let's look at American dreams, and seeing them come true."

Later in the press conference, Gohmert was offended after a reporter suggested that Republicans were "playing politics" with immigration.

"Playing politics! Us, playing politics with this issue?" he opined, adding that the Central American refugees were an "existential threat to America."

"It's a threat to our existence!" the Texas Republican exclaimed. "It occurs to me that this president is to our Constitution as Putin is to Ukraine."

Watch the video below from Sen. Ted Cruz, broadcast Sept. 9, 2014.