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Congressional Republicans hatched a radical plan last fall. When Democrats tried to advance an emergency package that would provide support for, among others, U.S. allies in Ukraine, GOP officials said they’d only consider the aid package if Democrats agreed to far-right immigration and border policies.
If the goal was to force Democrats to the negotiating table, the gambit worked like a charm: Democrats not only agreed to months of talks, they’ve also made a great many concessions in the hopes of striking a compromise deal.
As NBC News reported, the finish line is within sight.
Leading Senate Republicans are warning their House colleagues not to play political games with the current immigration negotiations because they won’t get a better deal down the road under a potential second Donald Trump presidency. “To those who think that if President Trump wins, which I hope he does, that we can get a better deal — you won’t,” Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told reporters Wednesday.
Though a final agreement is not yet in place, Senate Democratic leaders have indicated that there might be floor action on a deal as early as next week.
There’s no shortage of questions — about the contents of a possible compromise, the merits of the policies, the support it might garner in the upper chamber, etc. But perhaps the biggest question of all is whether a bipartisan package of reforms, if it cleared the Senate, could get through the far-right House.
The fact that House Speaker Mike Johnson is coordinating with Donald Trump suggests no one should get their hopes up. Politico reported:
Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday night that he had talked about congressional border negotiations with former President Donald Trump, who urged him to oppose compromising. “He and I have been talking about this pretty frequently,” Johnson said on Fox News hours after meeting with President Joe Biden and congressional leaders. Johnson last spoke with Trump on Monday night, the speaker said.
Shortly before midnight, the former president published an item to his social media platform, saying Congress should reject a bipartisan agreement unless Democrats agree to give Republicans “EVERYTHING” the GOP wants.
It’s important to emphasize that Trump has barked related orders before, which have gone ignored. He told House Republicans to make Rep. Jim Jordan the House speaker, for example, and many GOP members balked. The former president has also called for government shutdowns, debt-ceiling default, Mitch McConnell’s replacement as Senate minority leader, and the rejection of a bipartisan infrastructure bill and a proposed overhaul of the Electoral Count Act. In each instance, he didn’t get his way.
But as a possible deal on immigration and border policies takes shape, Trump is more likely to succeed — in part because the House speaker is coordinating his efforts with the former president, in part because some GOP members will deem the deal insufficiently right-wing, and in part because too many Republican lawmakers will want to kill the compromise in order to deny President Joe Biden an election-year win on a major issue.
Much of the party would rather have a campaign issue than a solution.
During George W. Bush’s tenure, Democratic and GOP officials reached an agreement on immigration policy, which far-right House Republicans killed. During Barack Obama’s second term, Democratic and GOP officials reached an agreement on immigration policy, which easily passed the Senate, and which far-right House Republicans also killed.
Will recent history repeat itself? Watch this space.