Schumer resurrects bipartisan border security plan as Senate GOP rallies against it
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer is planning to dust off border security legislation that collapsed back in February for a standalone vote this week.
Although the bill likely will not pass, the planned vote dovetails with President Biden’s expected executive actions on the border as Democrats scramble for ways to prevent backlash from voters this fall over the ongoing migrant crisis.
“We are hopeful this bipartisan proposal will bring serious-minded Republicans back to the table to advance this bipartisan solution for our border,” Schumer (D-NY) wrote in a letter to colleagues Sunday.
“I will be honest: I do not expect all Democrats to support this legislation,” the 73-year-old added.
The previous version of the bill set aside roughly $20 billion for border security, shifted most asylum cases to the Department of Homeland Security for processing with more stringent standards to judge claims, and the authority to automatically deport migrants entering the US after crossings surpass 4,000 per day (that provision becomes mandatory after crossings eclipse 5,000 per day).
Back in February, following roughly four months of negotiations, Sens. James Lankford (R-Okla.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Kyrsten Sinema (I-Ariz.) unveiled the text for a deal to tackle the border crisis and marshal aid for Ukraine, Israel, and the Indo-Pacific.
Initially, Republicans had insisted that border security be paired with any assistance package for war-torn Ukraine. But Republicans panned the border provisions and the deal came 11 votes short of breaking the Senate’s 60-vote legislative filibuster.
Prominent Democrats and Democrat-aligned senators, including Ed Markey of Massachusetts, Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Bob Menendez of New Jersey, and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, also voted against the bill.
Democrats blamed former President Donald Trump and accused him of wanting to preserve the border crisis as a political issue ahead of the Nov. 5 presidential election.
“Unfortunately, just as the border proposal was being finalized, former President Trump demanded Congressional Republicans kill the legislation,” Schumer alleged in his letter.
“The former President made clear he would rather preserve the issue for his campaign than solve the issue in a bipartisan fashion.”
GOP detractors raised concerns with the 4,000-a-day threshold provision, questioning whether Biden would ever actually use that authority without being made to do so.
“Leader Schumer is trying [to] give his vulnerable members cover by bringing a vote on a bill which has already failed once in the Senate because it would actually codify many of the disastrous Biden open border policies that created this crisis in the first place,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and other House GOP leadership said in a statement.
“Should it reach the House, the bill would be dead on arrival.”
Instead, Republican leaders have called on the Senate to take up their package — the Secure the Border Act of 2023, also known as H.R. 2 — which Democrats have rejected.
Even Lankford ripped into the revival attempt as a “stunt.”
“This bipartisan border legislation would deliver the significant policy changes, resources, and personnel needed to secure our border and make our country safer,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said in a statement Monday morning
“We strongly support this legislation and call on every Senator to put partisan politics aside and vote to secure the border.”
A series of surveys have shown that the crisis unfolding at the US-Mexico border remains a top issue for voters — and that they most often fault Biden for it.
Between Oct. 1, 2023, and the end of April, there have been 1,520,502 encounters at the southwest land border, according to US Customs and Border Patrol — a figure that does not include thousands of so-called “gotaways” who have escaped into the interior.
During the last fiscal year, which ended on Sept. 30, 2023, there were a record-breaking 2,475,669 encounters.
Schumer’s attempted revival of the border deal comes as Democrats are staring down a brutal electoral map this cycle, forced to defend 23 Senate seats while Republicans are tasked with holding only 11.
