SUPPOSEDLY this will be a weekend government shutdown because the house is in recess and it will be passed by the house Monday or Tuesday. Democrats have stayed united this time, maybe they learned their lesson after the healthcare fiasco from trusting the gop / greed over people-republican party. This from the New York Times
Senate Democrats and White House Reach Deal to Avoid Shutdown
The Senate is heading for a key test vote this morning on a spending package that would keep the government open past Friday as negotiations continue between the White House and Senate Democrats over the fate of funding for the Department of Homeland Security.
Even if the pieces fall in place on an agreement to break out the D.H.S. money as Democrats want, time is short and a partial government shut down remains a real possibility into at least early next week. How the preliminary vote fares – or if it even happens as scheduled – will depend on how productive senators believe talks with the White House have been.
Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, reiterated the demands his party had laid out in exchange for voting to allow the bill that funds the Department of Homeland Security to advance.
Those demands include that federal agents enforcing President Trump’s immigration crackdown take off their masks and stop warrantless searches and arrests.
In his remarks on the Senate floor, Schumer did not comment on the ongoing discussions between the White House and Senate Democrats, minutes ahead of a test vote in the chamber on a broader spending package that does not include any of those demands.
Trump said he was hopeful that negotiations with Democrats would stave off a government shutdown.
“Hopefully we won’t have a shutdown,” he told his cabinet. “We’re working on that right now. I think we’re getting close. The Democrats, I don’t believe want to see it either. So we’ll work in a very bipartisan way I believe not to have a shutdown. We don’t want to shut down.”
Without congressional action, federal funding does not extend past Friday.
Representative Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said that House and Senate Democrats were “on the same page” when it came to a list of restrictions they wanted to add in order to fund the Homeland Security Department. He backed splitting a bill on it from a larger spending package.
Jeffries said that he had not been involved with conversations with the White House, but that he and House Democrats would “evaluate whatever bill comes over to us on its merit.”
Asked about a possible short-term extension for homeland security operations that would allow lawmakers time to negotiate new restrictions on immigration enforcement, Representative Hakeem Jeffries, the Democratic leader, did not expressly endorse the idea and said only that an extension “cannot be endless, and it cannot be long, and that’s the most that I’ll say about it.”
Senate Democrats on Thursday struck a deal with President Trump and Republicans that could avert a government shutdown and buy more time to negotiate restrictions on the administration’s immigration crackdown.
The agreement, if it holds, would allow the Senate to act before a Friday midnight deadline to fund a large portion of the government for the remainder of the fiscal year. It would also provide two weeks of funding for the Department of Homeland Security while lawmakers and White House officials negotiate over Democrats’ demands to rein in federal immigration agents.
Senators said they hoped to vote on the deal on Friday, after their hopes of pushing it through on Thursday night faded amid objections from rank-and-file Republicans.
But the deal reflected an abrupt political shift that has taken hold at the White House and on Capitol Hill after the fatal shooting last weekend of Alex Pretti, an American citizen, by a federal agent in Minneapolis, the second such killing this month.
Mr. Trump has rushed this week to change the face of his immigration operations in Minneapolis, and Republicans in Congress who rarely criticize him or his administration have vented their concern about the tactics being used and the goals of the operation, conceding that major changes are needed.
One of the Republicans who objected to swiftly passing the deal was Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina. Mr. Graham called the agreement a “bad deal” and appeared to be unhappy that it included a House-authored provision to repeal a law that created a new avenue for senators to sue the government if federal investigators gained access to their phone records without notifying them.
Mr. Graham, who under the law was eligible to seek at least $500,000 in damages, had been among the only senators to publicly defend the measure.
It was also unclear how quickly the House could move on the legislation, which would need that chamber’s approval before it could become law. If it fails to pass, government funding would lapse on Saturday morning.
Speaker Mike Johnson said that the earliest the House could act would be Monday.
“We may inevitably be in a short shutdown situation,” Mr. Johnson told reporters Thursday night at a screening of “Melania,” a documentary about the first lady, at the Kennedy Center. “But the House is going to do its job.”
The agreement came after Democrats earlier on Thursday followed through on their pledge to oppose the spending package, which includes $64.4 billion for the Department of Homeland Security as well as an array of government agencies, including the Pentagon and health programs. Every Democrat opposed moving forward, as did several Republicans, citing various spending objections.
After Mr. Pretti’s death, Democrats had said they would not vote for any further funding for the Department of Homeland Security unless strict limits were added to curtail immigration officers’ tactics. They demanded that the homeland security portion be separated from the rest of the spending package and held up while they try to strike a deal with Mr. Trump and Republicans for new restrictions on the president’s immigration crackdown.
“This is a moment of truth,” Senator Chuck Schumer, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, said on Thursday. “Congress must act to rein in ICE and end the violence.”
Mr. Schumer and the president began negotiations late Wednesday to resolve the dispute and head off a government shutdown, according to two officials familiar with the talks who described them on the condition of anonymity.
In a social media post, Mr. Trump endorsed the deal, saying “another long and damaging Government Shutdown” would be bad for the country. “Hopefully, both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan ‘YES’ Vote” to the agreement, he wrote.
Republican lawmakers had also said they were hopeful about avoiding a prolonged shutdown — following the record-breaking 43-day lapse in federal funding last fall — and criticized Democrats’ opposition to the funding package.
“This nation deserves safety and security,” said Senator John Barrasso of Wyoming, the No. 2 Senate Republican. “Not another government shutdown.”
The administration’s talks with Democrats began after the lawmakers unveiled a set of demands they said they would insist on in exchange for voting for homeland security funding. They included banning immigration officers from wearing masks and requiring them to wear body cameras and visible identification, an end to random immigration sweeps, requirements for judicial warrants for stop and searches and requirements for immigration officers to follow the same use-of-force standards as community law enforcement.
They also want an independent investigation of the two fatal shootings in Minneapolis.
“No more secret police,” Mr. Schumer said. “The Republican majority must step up to the plate. Republicans in Congress cannot allow this violent status quo to continue. They must work with Democrats on legislation — real legislation.”
If the spending agreement holds, it would clear the way for what promises to be a hard-fought negotiation over what restrictions could be imposed on immigration operations.
Some Republicans were already raising objections to the Democratic demands, including the ban on masks.
“I’m worried about these guys who are being put into a dangerous situation in crowds, where you know damn well some of the people there are just there to play gotcha,” Senator Thom Tillis, Republican of North Carolina, said. “I just think that is a police safety issue, and I’m black-and-white on police safety issues.”
Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, said he believed the restrictions being pursued by his party would be seen by the public as “reasonable, popular and necessary to reform these gross abuses.”
“I think people see that it is like, ‘Yeah, why wouldn’t we do that?’” Mr. Kaine said.
Luke Broadwater contributed reporting.
Senator Markwayne Mullin, Republican of Oklahoma, who frequently acts as an emissary between the Senate and the White House, suggested to reporters that senators could vote as soon as tonight on five spending bills to fund the government, and a short-term stopgap bill to temporarily fund the Homeland Security Department. That would buy lawmakers more time to negotiate new guardrails for ICE agents, but Senate Democrats and the White House are still negotiating over how long that stopgap bill would fund the department.
Many Senate Democrats favor a bill that would fund the department for up to two weeks, while Republicans favor “no less than four weeks,” Mullin said.
Senate Democrats have struck a deal with Republicans and the White House to pass five spending bills to fund a large portion of the government for the remainder of the fiscal year, as well as a stopgap measure to fund the Department of Homeland Security for two weeks while they continue negotiating guardrails to rein in immigration agents. Republicans had pushed to fund the department for several weeks, but Democrats insisted on a shorter-term measure. It is unclear how quickly the House can and will process those funding bills after the Senate passes them. The shutdown deadline is midnight on Friday.
President Trump endorsed a spending deal between Senate Democrats and Republicans that would stave off a government shutdown while lawmakers continue negotiating guardrails to rein in immigration agents.
“Hopefully, both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan “YES” Vote,” Trump wrote on social media.
No comments:
Post a Comment