House Passes $694 Million Border Bill

Wall Street Journal

By Kristina Peterson

August 1, 2014

House Passes $694 Million Border Bill

WASHINGTON—The new House GOP leadership team's first official day on the job should have marked the beginning of a five-week recess. Instead, top House Republicans scrambled to wrest support for a $694 million bill to deal with the influx of migrants at the Southern border, revising the measure to satisfy the most conservative lawmakers.

The bill was approved on a 223-189 vote late Friday, with four Republicans joining all but one Democrat in opposing it. But the path to passage proved arduous, forcing leaders to postpone votes on their original legislation Thursday after conservatives—buoyed by GOP Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas, Jeff Sessions of Alabama and outside conservative groups—objected.

While GOP leaders ended the week with a legislative victory achieved with little Democratic help, the turmoil underscored the difficulty of their job. After the August recess, Congress will be confronted with spending bills and volatile foreign policy just weeks before November's midterm elections.

Trying to pass legislation without any Democratic votes "is really, really hard," since the opposition of outside groups compels leaders to focus their attention on the handful of lawmakers whose resistance can kill a bill, said Rep. Tom Rooney (R., Fla.) "It's almost impossible because they will dig in," he said.

Given that the measure has virtually no chance of becoming law, failure to pass it held few practical consequences. But many lawmakers had pushed for a vote, fearing the political ramifications of taking no action to deal with the crossing of 57,000 Central American children since October.

Senate Democrats' bill, which provided $2.7 billion for the border crisis through the end of the calendar year, stalled on a procedural vote Thursday. And lawmakers are sharply split on policy questions, leaving no clear path to compromise when they return in September.

President Barack Obama chided Republicans Friday for working to pass "the most extreme and unworkable versions of a bill that they already know is going nowhere," and said he that he would act alone to address the border crisis. He offered no specific plans but said resources would need to be reallocated to address border issues.

House GOP leaders' strategy of securing enough support for the border bill by appeasing conservatives' concerns alarmed Democrats who said the party was moving steadily to the right.

"It is clear to me that the most extreme, anti-immigrant, couple of dozen members of their caucus who speak the loudest dictate the terms of the future of the Republican caucus," said Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D., Ill.) "They just drag their party into oblivion, into national irrelevance."

But the process delighted conservatives, who met with new Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R., La.) Thursday night to air their lingering concerns, which later were translated into legislative tweaks to the final bill. The revised bill included an additional $35 million for states to pay for deploying the National Guard to the border. All of its spending would be offset by tapping into unused funds in other parts of the budget.

"We were absolutely heard," said Rep. Michele Bachmann (R., Minn.) "This is the model of the process that the House Republicans need to follow. Leadership got that message."

It isn't clear if House Republicans would follow the same strategy on must-pass fiscal bills coming up this fall or next year, when the federal borrowing limit must again be raised. Previously Republicans have often defied their most conservative members and compromised with Democrats on the debt-ceiling and some spending measures.

But GOP leaders likely will have to contend in the future with similar moves by their right wing, buoyed by Mr. Cruz, a potential 2016 GOP presidential candidate who has met frequently with House lawmakers. With his encouragement, House Republicans extracted from leaders a vote later Friday to prevent Mr. Obama from expanding his 2012 decision to halt deportations of some young illegal immigrants. That bill passed, 216-192.

"Conservatives had a problem with the bill in the first place and Sen Cruz ignited the gasoline that was already on the bill," said Ron Bonjean, co-founder of Singer Bonjean Strategies and a former senior Senate Republican staffer.

Though many GOP lawmakers resented what they saw as meddling from Mr. Cruz, his involvement could help bolster his credibility after helping stoke support for the strategy that led to last fall's partial government shutdown, Mr. Bonjean said. "This is about Sen. Ted Cruz positioning himself with Republican primary voters for 2016 after the failed government shutdown strategy."

Lawmakers also met with Mr. Sessions, an adamant immigration critic who urged Alabama constituents to flood their congressmen with calls opposing the bill, lawmakers said.

To meet conservatives' demands, lawmakers tightened provisions of the bill dealing with the 2008 anti-trafficking law that has been slowing deportations of the Central American children. The changes make it easier to send home children who don't have a credible fear of persecution.

They also tweaked the separate measure preventing the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program from expanding. The bill would also block Mr. Obama from moving to halt deportations of any other illegal immigrants, in response to reports that after Labor Day, he may use executive authority to offer safe harbor and work permits to millions more people.

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