Sen. Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the majority leader, said Thursday that he would schedule a test vote next week on a measure that would couple an immigration crackdown with tens of billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine and Israel, but the package remains stalled a difficult path with Republican opposition in both chambers.
Mr. Schumer’s promise came as a small group of Republican and Democratic senators rushed to finalize a plan to curb migration across the U.S. border with Mexico, which Republicans had paired with further aid to Kiev in the war against Russian aggression.
Senate leaders of both parties called the emerging border agreement the best chance in decades to address the stubborn problem of immigration, and President Biden has endorsed it. But right-wing Republicans, egged on by former President Donald J. Trump, have called it too weak, prompting Speaker Mike Johnson to declare it dead upon arrival in the House and suggest it may not make its way through Congress .
And since negotiators have not yet released the text of their agreement, it is not yet clear whether Senate Republicans will accept or reject it. Mr. Schumer said the finished product would be released “no later than Sunday” to give senators enough time to consider it before an initial vote expected on Wednesday.
“We are getting very close,” Mr. Schumer said on the Senate floor, arguing that the upcoming bill would be an important tool “allowing us to address multiple crises around the globe.”
“Dealing with these challenges is not easy, but we cannot simply shirk our responsibilities just because a task is difficult,” he added.
The deal would make it more difficult to grant asylum to migrants in the United States, increase detention capacity, increase deportations of people seeking to enter the country without authorization and close the U.S.-Mexico border to new arrivals if those cross the border more than a certain height.
It would be part of a package that includes a cash injection to Ukraine and Israel for its war in Gaza, as well as humanitarian aid to the bombed Palestinians and resources to counter Chinese influence and threats in the Indo-Pacific region.
In recent weeks, leading House Republicans and many rank-and-file Republican senators have denounced the compromise, arguing that it is not strict enough to make a meaningful difference in border crossings – and insisting that the Biden administration cannot be trusted fully implement the proposed measures.
Mr. Biden last week called on Congress to pass the deal and promised to use it to “close the border.” Mr. Johnson, a Republican from Louisiana, criticized the president for those words in a speech on the House floor this week, arguing that he already has the power to close the border to most new arrivals.
“He falsely claimed that he needed Congress to pass a new law to allow the southern border to be closed; He knows that’s not true,” Johnson said, adding, “This so-called deal does not include those transformative policy changes that are needed to actually stop the border disaster.”
The Senate’s planned vote on the border deal could coincide with House Republicans’ plans to impeach Mr. Biden’s Homeland Security Secretary, Alejandro N. Mayorkas, as early as next week for refusing to enforce border laws and violating the public trust. The Biden administration and several leading constitutional law experts, including conservatives, have argued that the case is a political dispute that does not rise to the level of a punishable felony or misdemeanor.
Senate Republican leaders and those close to the negotiations have tried to persuade skeptics not to listen to critics until they see the text of the deal for themselves. But the longer it takes to close a deal, the greater the concern about losing ground.
“If we don’t get this out there and increase the momentum, as I said, the mountain is going to get steeper and steeper,” Senator Thom Tillis, Republican of North Carolina, told reporters on Thursday.
Opposition in the House of Representatives and from Mr. Trump, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, is proving to be a significant obstacle. Last week, Sen. Mitch McConnell, Republican of Kentucky and minority leader, warned that Mr. Trump’s hostility to the deal had put Republicans “in a bind.”
Asked Thursday whether his colleagues would be able to overcome Mr. Trump’s resistance and accept the deal, Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the No. 2 Republican, said: “I can’t answer that yet.”
Democrats said time for compromise was running out and Republicans, who had originally called for a border deal, were now threatening to stand in the way of the bill.
“They are making a decision whether they want to do what they said they would do — pass a bipartisan border bill — or whether they want to follow the will of Donald Trump,” said Sen. Christopher S. Murphy of Connecticut, the top Democrat in the border talks. “Every day that goes by that they don’t commit to financing the deal is a day that we get closer to their decision in favor of Donald Trump.”
Source link
2024-02-01 23:46:30
www.nytimes.com
