Bloomberg
is reporting this week that Republican congressional leaders are struggling to
separate the immigration blow-up from a funding bill to avert a U.S. government
shutdown at the end of this week.
Democrats,
of course, say the burden is on Trump to help break the stalemate after he
rejected a bipartisan proposal to shield young, undocumented immigrants from
deportation and ignited outrage by reportedly disparaging Haiti and African
nations. Democrats want to attach such an immigration measure to the must-pass
spending bill, an idea House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., and Senate Majority
Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., reject.
“No,
we’re not going to do that," Ryan said Friday during an event in his home
state of Wisconsin. "People are attaching these as far as leverage is
concerned," but Republican leaders won’t go along, he said.
Government
funding runs out at the end of the day Friday, and Republican leaders are
weighing another short-term measure that would extend it until Feb. 16, a
person familiar with the negotiations said.
Trump
blamed Democrats in Twitter postings Tuesday. Arguing that, “We must have
Security at our VERY DANGEROUS SOUTHERN BORDER, and we must have a great WALL
to help protect us, and to help stop the massive inflow of drugs pouring into
our country!”
Both
parties have struggled for months to agree on a spending deal for the rest of
the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, and Congress already has had to pass three
short-term funding bills. Democrats want to use the next attempt to keep government
operations funded as a vehicle for other bills to provide disaster-relief
funds, shore up Obamacare, extend the Children’s Health Insurance Program, and
protect young immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children. A dispute
over how much to allocate to defense and domestic programs also has been an
obstacle to a broader fiscal agreement.
GOP
leaders don’t expect to have enough time to write a fiscal year spending bill
even if they get a breakthrough in negotiations this week, Bloomberg says.
Senate
Democratic leader Charles Schumer will have to decide whether this is the
moment to force a showdown on immigration that results in a partial government
shutdown in an election year.
Republicans’
slim 51-49 Senate majority means they need at least nine Democratic votes to
pass a spending bill. The GOP is counting on support from some Democrats,
including from among the 10 who are up for election in November in states won
by Trump.
Democratic
Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, who is on the ballot in November and who
voted with Republicans to help keep the government operating with a stop-gap
measure in December, said he has little desire to see a shutdown. He said he
remains confident that some kind of deal on immigration can be worked out
before it comes to that.
Republicans
have a wider majority in the House -- they hold 239 seats in the chamber and
218 are needed to pass a bill. But even there, GOP leaders are working with a
thin margin.
Meanwhile,
some House conservatives, including those in the Freedom Caucus, are
threatening to withhold their votes on a stopgap continuing resolution to
protest rising spending levels or to force an increase for defense.
“If
it’s just a yes or a no on a CR, I would be a no,” said Representative Warren
Davidson, R-Ohio, a Freedom Caucus member. But he said he doubts there will
ultimately be a shutdown.
“I
don’t know anyone who truly wants the government to shut down,” Davidson said
on a conference call with reporters.
The
immigration talks were set back Thursday when Trump sided with Republican
immigration hardliners and rejected a plan negotiated among a small group of
Democratic and Republican senators. The proposal, presented by Senators Dick
Durbin D-Ill., and Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., during an Oval Office meeting with a
group of lawmakers, combined border security and immigration-law
changes--sought mainly by Republicans--with a measure to permanently shield an
estimated 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. as children from
deportation.
The
furor over the president’s reported remarks about why the U.S. accepts
immigrants from undeveloped countries like Haiti, El Salvador and African
nations rather than places like Norway has hardened positions on both sides.
Trump has denied using those exact words, which were confirmed by three people
briefed on the exchange.
Durbin
and Graham are seeking more sponsors for their compromise plan in an attempt to
force a vote and additional discussions are expected later this week.
So, we
will see. It seems that almost nobody wants a shutdown, but nobody wants to
back away from the confrontation. Clearly, this is a fight producers should
watch closely as it proceeds, Washington Insider believes.