- The Senate will vote to move to border package that Republicans blasted
- Schumer will then will move to consider a package WITHOUT border provisions
- Biden hammered Republicans for lacking ‘spine’ and yielding to Trump
The $118 billion bipartisan border security bill officially fell apart in the Senate Wednesday after conservative Republicans trashed the compromise package negotiated with the guidance of party leaders.
Republicans quickly rejected Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s vote to move the $118 bill border security bill forward 50 to 49 following days of outrage by the GOP. They said the bill didn’t go far enough to secure the border.
Schumer, D-N.Y., said the vote would ‘show who is serious about securing the border – and who is not.’
Republican Senator John Kennedy said: ‘The border bill is as dead as Woodrow Wilson.’
But top Republican John Cornyn, R-Texas, said on the floor that the Democrats’ ‘fake outrage’ about the derailed deal won’t fool Americans.
It was just the latest demonstration of chaos in Congress, after House leaders failed to muster enough votes to pass a separate $17 billion package to provide U.S. aid to Israel Tuesday.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) lambasted Republicans for backing away from a border compromise that also includes aid for Ukraine and Israel. He plans to call up a package stripped of the controversial border provisions if a procedural motion fails as expected
The deal’s destruction came despite Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Schumer both backing the proposal, which President Joe Biden also supported.
But former President Donald Trump had been lobbying against it, calling it a ‘death wish’ for the Republican Party.
Now senators will get the chance to vote on a thinner $95 billion package stripped of border language entirely, under a maneuver by Schumer.
Schumer’s gambit comes after President Joe Biden ripped congressional Republicans for lacking ‘spine’ after they helped doom a bipartisan compromise that would have included $20 billion in new border enforcement funds.
Democrats blame former President Donald Trump, who inveighed against the deal, for pulling the strings and wrecking the chance of a compromise in an election year.
‘When President Trump came along and said he didn’t want to solve the border problem, that he wanted it as a campaign issue, [House] Speaker Johnson obediently changed his tune, fumed Schumer.
He repeatedly connected the GOP’s opposition to Russian President Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, which is approaching its two-year anniversary.
‘Last night, members of the other side of the aisle met to decide whether they were going to side with the American people or obey the wishes of former President Trump and his friend Vladimir Putin,’ said Schumer.
‘Tomorrow, the American people will find out whether Senators seek border security and oppose Russian expansionism, or whether they stand with former President Trump in support of chaos and Vladimir Putin,’ he added in remarks on the Senate floor.
After the vote to take up the package presumably fails to get 60 votes, Schumer plans to take out the border provisions, which Republicans had demanded in principle while balking at the details, and instead bring up ’emergency’ supplemental appropriations to provide $60 billion to Ukraine, boost support for Israel, and provide additional funds for Taiwan along with reconstruction aid for Gaza.
![The U.S. has had to cut military aid to Ukraine after its budget authority ran dry. The two-year anniversary of Russia's invasion is approaching](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/02/07/15/80968135-13056681-image-a-15_1707318768178.jpg)
The U.S. has had to cut military aid to Ukraine after its budget authority ran dry. The two-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion is approaching
![Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said he would support a move to a clean bill. He was hammered by conservative MAGA-aligned members of his conference over helping set up the border compromise](https://i.dailymail.co.uk/1s/2024/02/07/15/80968137-13056681-image-a-16_1707318771494.jpg)
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said he would support a move to a clean bill. He was hammered by conservative MAGA-aligned members of his conference over helping set up the border compromise
That will give him the chance to present Republicans with a second procedural motion – this time without the border language that was intended to win over Republicans. One provision allows the administration to shut the border when daily border crossings hit 5,000.
‘Schumer told members of his caucus and the White House last week that if the Republicans scuttled the bipartisan border and supplemental agreement, he had prepared a plan to use the motion to reconsider to force Republicans to vote on the supplemental without border [reforms],’ a Senate Democratic aide told the Hill.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he would support a ‘clean’ package on Ukraine aide. Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas), who was among those trashing the border package, said he would as well.
Such a package would likely be doomed in the Republican-run House, which on Tuesday failed to impeach Homeland Security Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas and failed to pass a package considering only of aid for Israel.
The Senate votes come after Senate conservatives unloaded on the compromise, with some even calling for a leadership change due to McConnell’s role helping push it forward.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, who opposed McConnell when he was reelected to his post in 2022, said Tuesday it was time for him to go. ‘I think a Republican leader should actually lead this conference and should advance the priorities of Republicans,’ he said.
McConnell has been a regular target of Trump’s. The two men haven’t spoken since Jan. 6th, even as Trump moves closer and closer to securing his party’s nomination.