The U.S. Senate labored over a $70-billion immigration enforcement bill late into the night on Thursday, as Republicans rejected more than a dozen Democratic amendments, including attempts to kill a $1.8 billion “anti-weaponization” fund that President Donald Trump has sought.
The $70 billion would help pay for Trump’s controversial migrant deportation crackdown over the next three years and would augment about $100 billion in unspent Department of Homeland Security law enforcement money enacted last year by Republicans, who control Congress.
If the Senate manages to pass the new funding, the House of Representatives could debate it as soon as next week.
TRUMP SAYS FUND IS ‘SO IMPORTANT’
Lawmakers began voting on amendments to the immigration bill in a “vote-a-rama” session early on Thursday that was expected to end in a vote on the underlying measure by Friday.
An initial move by Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer to kill what Democrats call a “slush fund” for Trump’s allies brought the session to a largely procedural halt for hours after Republican Senator Susan Collins voted for the motion.
She was later joined by fellow Republicans Jon Husted and Dan Sullivan.
“It’s heinous and it won’t die until we permanently ban it by law,” Schumer said of the $1.776 billion fund in a Senate floor speech.
His measure failed in a 50-49 vote but exposed the political turmoil among rank-and-file Senate Republicans. Some of them sought their own amendments to eliminate the fund permanently, five months before the November midterm elections. Collins, Husted and Sullivan all face competitive races for reelection at a time when Trump’s approval rating is down, even among Republicans.
The fund, which critics say would allow Trump to use taxpayer dollars to compensate his political allies, has already been put on hold by the White House and Justice Department over fierce opposition from Senate Republicans.
But on Wednesday, Trump declined to say whether the fund had actually been terminated, telling reporters: “I love it. I think it’s so important.”
Republican Senator Thom Tillis, who opposed Schumer’s motion, told reporters he would not support passage of the funding bill without a Republican amendment vote to codify acting Attorney General Todd Blanche’s congressional testimony that the administration was abandoning the fund.
Tillis argued that failing to do so would place a burden on congressional Republicans up for re-election in November who are worried about a voter backlash to the fund.
OPPONENTS CALL FUND ‘IMMEDIATE AND DIRE THREAT’
Nearly all of the bill’s $70 billion would go to DHS’s Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol agencies that are carrying out the Trump administration’s vigorous deportations throughout the United States.
Tillis later offered his own amendment to reallocate the Trump fund’s resources to fraud-enforcement operations. It failed in an 84-15 vote while garnering support from 12 Republicans.