U.S. Senate Republicans abandoned plans to vote on an ICE funding bill on Thursday in an act of revolt over one of President Donald Trump’s priorities: a $1.8 billion fund for victims of government “weaponization,” including those convicted of crimes during the Capitol riot on January 6, 2021.
The Senate walked away from a planned vote on a $72 billion bill funding Trump’s massive migrant deportation program, delaying the vote at least until June, when lawmakers return from a Memorial Day holiday recess.
From the beginning, Senate Majority Leader John Thune said the legislation should be narrowly targeted to secure the $72 billion. But at Trump’s behest, the $1.8 billion “weaponization” fund and another $1 billion for building a White House ballroom became major sticking points.
“It was something that was supposed to be very narrow, targeted, focused, clean, straightforward, and it got a little bit more complicated this week,” Thune said, expressing his frustration. “It makes everything way harder than it should be.”
The battle over the partisan Immigration and Customs Enforcement funding bill came on the heels of Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana losing his primary election to a Trump-backed challenger and the president endorsing the primary challenger to veteran Republican Senator John Cornyn of Texas.
Presidents usually back the incumbent lawmakers of their party in reelection bids.
Against that backdrop, Acting U.S. Attorney General Todd Blanche was summoned to Capitol Hill to face questions from angry senators when he made his case for the $1.8 billion fund designed to compensate Trump allies and other victims of government “weaponization.”
During Blanche’s meeting, several senators insisted the money not be used to compensate people convicted of assaulting law enforcement during the Capitol riot, the person said.
Trump had already pardoned many of those convicted for crimes they committed during that deadly assault.
“I think there are people who are concerned about public relations,” Senator Todd Young, an Indiana Republican, told reporters about the meeting.
Emotions were so raw that a planned White House meeting between Trump, Senate Republicans and House of Representatives Speaker Mike Johnson was canceled, according to a source familiar with the arrangement.
The resistance against Trump became evident late on Wednesday when Senate Republicans said “no” to $1 billion in new security funding for the 90,000-square-foot (8,360-square-meter) ballroom Trump wants to build on the site of the White House East Wing that he had razed last October.
For months, Trump has said no taxpayer dollars would be needed for the project. Nonetheless, a $1 billion tab to be picked up by taxpayers stared senators in the face as an add-in to a $72 billion bill for Trump’s migrant deportation program.
Democrats hammered away about a “glitzy,” “gauzy” “vanity project,” a preview of their midterm election pitch addressing voters’ worries about the high prices of food, housing, healthcare and particularly gasoline, which skyrocketed after the February 28 U.S. attack on Iran.
Thune, who started the week with a tense phone call with the president over his endorsement against Cornyn, told reporters after Thursday’s meeting that his party “will pick up where we left off” after the holiday recess.
Republican Senator Thom Tillis of North Carolina, who is not running for reelection, did not hold back in criticizing Trump.
“I think it’s stupid on stilts,” Tillis said of the “weaponization” fund in an interview with Spectrum News. “The American people are going to reject this out of hand. (JapanToday)
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