The latest immigration debate, which Senators expected to last a week and end with the president’s signature, lasted for about an hour on the floor Thursday and ended in no amendments passed to protect DACA recipients or send funding for President Donald Trump’s border wall.
The bipartisan deal failed to get the necessary 60 votes needed for passage. The deal would have given a pathway to citizenship for almost 2 million undocumented immigrants, while at the same time providing funding for the wall on the Mexico border. The vote was 54-45.
“I’m ready to move on. We wasted a whole week here. And I’m ready to move on. There are other issues in front of us,” said Senator John Kennedy.
According to CNN, lawmakers were furious and blamed each other for the failed negotiations which took weeks and resulted in no resolution for a population everyone agreed they had wanted to help.
A group of bipartisan senators was infuriated by the White House’s treatment of their proposals, which according to them could have inched toward passage if only the White House stayed on the sidelines and not lobbied against them.
The deal, although brokered without Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, was referred to as the Schumer amendment in an effort to undermine it. Republican Senator Mike Rounds admitted that games were “being played,” while President Trump issued a veto threat to the amendment.
Senator Lindsey Graham claimed Thursday that the deal was “poorly drafted…for the purpose of gutting immigration enforcement” whereas Democrat Chris Coons blamed the White House “a great deal.”
The bipartisan amendment failed to secure the other six votes it needed but still fared better than a White House-backed plan that would have substantially increased federal deportation powers, heavily cut family-based legal migration and ended the diversity visa, which failed 39-60.
With just weeks to go until the original March 5 deadline and a week of recess ahead, members acknowledged there was little time left to find a breakthrough now. According to Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, the immigration issue is unlikely to be raised again soon.
“I don’t see it. We couldn’t get it together this week. We’ve got other things we have to do, which are pressing. The Majority Leader’s (Mitch McConnell) the one who sets the agenda. We need to get some things done: nominations, other bipartisan legislation. If I were him, I’d be reluctant to spend another week of wasted time,” he commented.
“I thought the deadline and I thought the empathy that people have for these young people would be enough to change the outcome here, but apparently not yet,” Cornyn concluded.
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