Senate negotiators released the text of their border security bill on Sunday after months of anticipation, and not everyone is happy about the details.
The bill has already amassed a significant group of detractors in Congress, specifically in the House of Representatives, leaving the chances of it ending up on President Joe Biden‘s desk in jeopardy. The border security legislation appears dead on arrival mainly due to these three key reasons.
House Republicans hate the bill
Ahead of the details of the bill releasing, House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and other top House GOP officials blasted reported provisions in the legislation, and with the text public, they have not changed their tune.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise (R-LA) opened the discourse from House GOP leadership on the details of the text by vowing not to give it a vote on the floor.
Let me be clear: The Senate Border Bill will NOT receive a vote in the House.
— Steve Scalise (@SteveScalise) February 5, 2024
Here’s what the people pushing this “deal” aren’t telling you: It accepts 5,000 illegal immigrants a day and gives automatic work permits to asylum recipients—a magnet for more illegal immigration.
“Let me be clear: The Senate Border Bill will NOT receive a vote in the House. Here’s what the people pushing this ‘deal’ aren’t telling you: It accepts 5,000 illegal immigrants a day and gives automatic work permits to asylum recipients — a magnet for more illegal immigration,” Scalise wrote in a post on X Sunday night.
Johnson also said he had “seen enough” and that the bill would be “dead on arrival” if it ever reached the House of Representatives.
I’ve seen enough. This bill is even worse than we expected, and won’t come close to ending the border catastrophe the President has created. As the lead Democrat negotiator proclaimed: Under this legislation, “the border never closes.”
— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) February 5, 2024
If this bill reaches the House, it will be…
“I’ve seen enough. This bill is even worse than we expected, and won’t come close to ending the border catastrophe the President has created. As the lead Democrat negotiator proclaimed: Under this legislation, ‘the border never closes.’ If this bill reaches the House, it will be dead on arrival,” Johnson wrote on X.
The House speaker had already expressed discontent over the bill in the hours leading up to its release, explaining on NBC News’s Meet the Press on Sunday that the House GOP was shut out of negotiations about the bill and he had not been briefed on the details while talks were ongoing in the upper chamber of Congress.
Senate GOP not unified behind the bill.
The GOP has been vocal about getting border legislation passed for years, but with the deal negotiated by Sens. James Lankford (R-OK), Kyrsten Sinema (I-AZ), and Chris Murphy (D-CT), there are already vocal critics of the proposal.
Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) accused Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) of undercutting the Republican Party over the compromise in an opinion piece for the Hill last week. He argued the GOP distrusts Biden to enforce border law and that McConnell would just be giving Biden a campaign item with no actual enhanced border protection.
“Securing the border requires forcing Biden to enforce the law. Nothing we have seen over the past three years suggests he will do that,” Scott wrote. “That’s why McConnell’s plan to give Biden and Democrats a win that they can campaign on and claim they’re working to solve the border crisis is a joke.”
Since the text has been released, several Republican senators have expressed their disapproval, including Sens. Josh Hawley (R-MO) and Mike Lee (R-UT). Lee called the bill a “betrayal of the American people” in a sharp rebuke on X on Sunday night.
Discontent from Biden campaign allies
While the bill has support from the White House, some allies of Biden’s reelection campaign and members of the left flank of the Democratic Party have concerns of their own.
One of Biden’s campaign national co-chairs, Rep. Veronica Escobar (D-TX), told Politico in an interview released on Sunday that she was “not happy” over Biden’s talk about the border leading up to the text being released. While she said it would not affect her support of Biden for reelection, she did say there were several red lines that would cause her to oppose the bill, including rapid expulsion.
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“It would be very hard for me to support it,” Escobar said while touting her own proposed bill regarding the border.
The bill is expected to receive an initial vote in the Senate on Wednesday. Alongside border security, the bill includes aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan. Johnson has offered up a separate Israel aid bill, without border security or aid to the other countries, for the House of Representatives to consider.
