The immigration battle may come to a head soon as President Barack Obama gets set to issue an executive order that's expected to have a major impact on the current immigration crisis. The order isn't expected to come until after summer, but it's likely the only option left since Congress remains deadlocked on an immigration reform bill.

There are more than 11 million people who have crossed the border into the United States in this recent wave.

There's no telling what moves Obama would make, but most people who are pro-immigration are pushing for him to slow-down or stop deportations and grant people work permits.

Republicans have said that granting work permits would require an entire reworking of the immigration reform process, since work is what most people cross over into the U.S. to get.

"Whatever he decides, it will pitch Washington into a political hurricane ahead of congressional elections in November in which Republicans hope to oust Democrats from control of the Senate," reported Reuters. "If the president takes these actions, he'll be sealing the deal on his legacy of lawlessness," House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner said.

As Reuters explains, the impeachment threat isn't as strong as some people may think, and some Republican lawmakers are even saying it's Democrats who are trumping up the issue to gain political support. An impeachment is actually very hard to come by.

But as Republicans might be distancing themselves from the talk of impeachment, Slate.com points out the origins of the current call to impeach Obama over his use of executive powers.

"On July 8 of this year, came Sarah Palin. Her PAC placed an op-ed at Breitbart.com, announcing that the time had come for the I-word. For inexplicable reasons, Palin can still shift a news cycle; in a lucky synchronicity, the Senate campaign of Iowa Democratic Rep. Bruce Braley chose July 8 to release a tape of his opponent calling for impeachment."

"Impeachment is a constitutional option used sparingly by Congress against a president. Republican Richard Nixon resigned under an impeachment cloud during the Watergate scandal in 1974, and Democrat Bill Clinton survived a messy, politically divisive impeachment battle in 1998 over the Monica Lewinsky scandal," according to Reuters.