President Joe Biden wants Congressional Republicans to wait until the new border security bill is introduced before attacking the proposal.
The Emergency National Security Supplemental Act was released on Feb. 4 and has been widely denounced by Republicans in Congress. The bill was created through bipartisan collaboration with input from the Biden administration.
However, Republicans in the House have pointed out that the $118 billion proposal designates $20 million for domestic border security and over $90 billion for foreign military and humanitarian assistance to several nations, predominantly Ukraine and Israel.
While speaking with reporters in Las Vegas on Feb. 5, Biden suggested that Republicans need to better understand the details of the deal.
“My message to Speaker Johnson is pay attention to what the Senate is doing. We got a bipartisan deal, so you’re gonna see the details of it this week, it’s going to be introduced on Wednesday,” the Democrat said, per The Hill.
The president also suggested that, by opposing the bill, Republicans were resisting his efforts to manage the border crisis and the record rates of illegal immigration under the first three years of his term.
"We don’t have enough agents. We don’t have enough folks. We don’t have enough judges,” Biden said. “We need help. Why won’t they give me the help?”
Biden also predicted the bill would pass with 60 votes.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson declared the proposed legislation “dead on arrival” in a joint statement with other members of the Republican House Leadership released on Feb. 5. The Republican declared that the bill failed “in every policy area needed to secure our border and would actually incentivize more illegal immigration.”
“The so-called ‘shutdown’ authority in the bill is anything but, riddled with loopholes that grant far too much discretionary authority to Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas – who has proven he will exploit every measure possible, in defiance of the law, to keep the border open,” the group said. They called on the Senate to take up the Secure the Border Act, which the lower chamber passed in May.
Several Republican senators, including Marsha Blackburn, Katie Boyd Britt, Ted Cruz, and Steve Daines, have already publicly stated their opposition to the border proposal.
Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina said he looks forward to “the amendment process to try to improve” the Emergency National Security Supplemental Act.
“Something this significant cannot be rushed and jammed through. It should be subject to a robust debate and amendment process in the Senate,” he said in a statement on Feb. 5. “I am hopeful that Senator Schumer will allow an open amendment process to occur. If not, then the bill will die because of process.”
“This issue is important to the American people. We must allow their voices to be heard when it comes to the Biden Border Disaster,” Graham added.
