(Rep. Mark E. Amodei) – The Homeland Security bill was separated from the other 11 appropriations bills last fall at the request of Democrats, who raised concerns about deportation and border operations.
In hindsight, that decision made an already difficult process even harder. It was a mistake not to handle it along with the other 11 bills like Defense, Agriculture, Interior, and others.
Since that time, the fundamental disagreement over this administration’s policy on the border and immigration has created partisan gridlock.
It has been, so far, impossible to come up with something that strikes any kind of fact-based balance.
The situation was further complicated by the shootings in the Twin Cities in January, and since then both sides have traded talking point political barbs, with no real process taking shape.
The House has passed, three times, the original funding bill that was agreed upon in a bicameral, bipartisan fashion, that bill has been largely ignored.
Last Friday, at three in the morning, with only a handful of people on the floor, the Senate used a procedure called unanimous consent, where the person in the chair relied on a voice vote to move forward a bill that excluded funding for ICE and Border Patrol.
They immediately sent that to the House and left town.
To be clear, this bill is not the same bill that was proposed by Rep. Rosa DeLauro, but since truth has very little to do with a lot of what people say around here, Democrats are claiming some sort of victory with this Senate jam bill.
What you have here is no changes in immigration policy, for which TSA, FEMA, USCG, Secret Service, and CISA have allegedly been shut down for a record 48 days.
Nothing has changed in a policy sense for ICE and Border Patrol and Border Patrol operations. They continue to be fully funded as a result of last year’s reconciliation bill.
If you’re confused, you should be.
So, we’re back to where we started.
Last Friday night, the House passed a bill to fully fund Department of Homeland Security for two months.
It’s my hope that we can recognize that what we’ve been doing isn’t working.
I feel an obligation to apologize on behalf of the entire Congress.
This has certainly not been anything resembling responsible focus on policies or problem solving.
The collateral damage to federal employees was apparently just for sport because nobody has any trophy out of this other than thumping their chest on TV and misleading people.
However, one thing that has not wavered is that I, along with my colleagues in the House, voted four times to fully fund Homeland Security operations globally, support the efforts of this administration, and pay all our federal employees.
The obsession with political sport is dumb, but here we are. I’ll be in touch.
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