Lawmaker’s react to Trump’s latest shutdown proposal
Published 10:25 am Wednesday, January 23, 2019
A spending bill aimed at ending the government shutdown, called the “End the Shutdown and Secure the Border Act,” is slated to go before the Republican-controlled U.S. Senate this week, according to the Associated Press (AP).
President Donald Trump’s proposal would provide deportation protection for some 700,000 immigrants currently covered by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, and provide an additional $12.7 billion in emergency relief funds for areas affected by natural disasters, in exchange for $5.7 billion for construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Additionally, the legislation would provide the needed funding for the departments currently closed as a result of the ongoing government shutdown, the longest in U.S. history.
The legislation is already being opposed by Democrats in Washington, who have repeatedly refused to negotiate border wall funding until the government is reopened, and immigration hardliners within the president’s own party.
Sen. Richard Shelby, R-AL, is gearing up to support the president’s proposal, which he calls a “serious compromise,” noting that it not only ends the shutdown but provides immigration reforms that “Democrats have long supported.”
“For the good of the country, I encourage my Democratic colleagues to either join us in passing this legislation or come to the negotiating table with constructive solutions of their own,” Shelby said in a statement. “Saying no to everything will not move our country forward.”
In a statement issued by the Senate Committee of Appropriations, of which Shelby is Chairman, the senator noted that the proposal provides “unprecedented investments in border security,” including additional law enforcement personnel, counter-narcotics and counter-weapons technology and more.
Sen. Doug Jones, D-AL, did not respond to requests for comment but has previously stated that he would like to see the government reopened while negotiations continue regarding funding for Trump’s border wall.
“We can come to an agreement on border security if we can just get the government open,” Jones said during a media call last week. “There are any number of people that, in good faith, will talk about border security. Until the president decides he’s going to come to the table and discuss that, I don’t know that we’re going to have much progress.”
Lawmakers in the U.S. House of Representatives are also weighing on Trump’s proposal which, even if it clears the Senate, has little hope of surviving the Democrat-led lower chamber.
In a video posted to Twitter Monday, Rep. Terri Sewell, D-AL, stood in front of the Selma Interpretive Center and blasted the president for the ongoing government shutdown. Sewell claimed Democrats support border security but it must be taken up in an effective manner, not via a wall.
“Here in Selma and across the country, federal workers are facing an injustice as a result of the government shutdown,” Sewell tweeted. “We must reopen government now.”
Sewell blasted Trump’s latest proposal as a “non-starter.”
“The President’s most recent partisan proposal to reopen the government is a non-starter and cannot garner enough support to ensure our federal workers get the pay they’re due,” Sewell said. “It’s past time to put politics aside and end the shutdown now.”
The House is slated to take up its own shutdown-ending legislation this week, which will provide an additional $1 billion for border security in the form of 75 new immigration judges and infrastructure upgrades but not a wall, according to a report from CBS News.