Senate Moving Forward with Legislation to Address Crisis at Our Southern Border
‘The House Democrats have failed to get their act together. So now the Senate is moving forward. Yesterday, thanks to the leadership of Chairman Shelby and Senator Leahy, the Appropriations Committee approved a significant funding measure by an overwhelming vote of 30 to 1.... Just the kind of big, bipartisan vote that we ought to see in this situation. Non-controversial funding for necessary programs to mitigate a national crisis. Republicans have been urging this kind of consensus for weeks.’
WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) regarding the humanitarian crisis at our southern border:
“For nearly two months, my Republican colleagues and I have come to the floor constantly to raise the alarm on the humanitarian crisis on our border. Record numbers of migrants have pressed upon the U.S.-Mexico border, including never-before-seen numbers of families and unaccompanied children. The agencies that care for these individuals and the facilities that house them have been stretched dangerously thin.
“We all know this. It’s why the administration requested supplemental funds seven weeks ago. It’s why agency heads and law enforcement officials have literally begged Congress to act. But until yesterday, we had not seen progress. Why? Because — stop me if this sounds familiar — the Democratic House of Representatives has been more interested in denying this White House whatever it asked for, however necessary it might be, simply because it was this White House that was asking for it.
“My friend the Democratic Leader has acknowledged publicly it was the Democrat-controlled House that has been the hurdle. One House Democrat from a border state has likewise admitted it’s the left flank of his own conference that’s been the stumbling block. As the press has noted, some leading Democrats let partisanship so cloud their judgment that they actually called the humanitarian problems a ‘manufactured’ crisis, or an ‘artificial’ crisis. Well, these seven weeks of wasted time have made two things abundantly clear: Partisanship doesn’t change the facts. And ‘the Resistance’ doesn’t pay the bills.
“The House Democrats have failed to get their act together. So now the Senate is moving forward. Yesterday, thanks to the leadership of Chairman Shelby and Senator Leahy, the Appropriations Committee approved a significant funding measure by an overwhelming vote of 30 to 1. Thirty to one. Just the kind of big, bipartisan vote that we ought to see in this situation. Non-controversial funding for necessary programs to mitigate a national crisis. Republicans have been urging this kind of consensus for weeks. And now the Senate is rising to the occasion. We need to vote on this legislation before we recess at the end of the month. The Senate should not let even more time slip by without addressing this crisis head-on. And if we receive the same kind of bipartisan cooperation that was signaled in the committee vote yesterday, we won’t have to.”
Related Issues: Immigration, Homeland Security
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