The border will be left unsecured and blank this year because House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) has proposed a deal that would separate border security from what little influence Republicans had.
In addition to funding the war between Ukraine and Israel, the Republican leadership’s plan would include a bill to force TikTok to divest from its Chinese owners, a bill to seize Russian bank assets, and other foreign aid and sanctions that would be sent to Congress in a package. I am planning to send it to. The Senate has a Democratic majority.
War parties get what they want, embezzlers spend what they want, and the latest tax bill is always passed.
Oh, and the rules committee too. Prime Minister Boris Johnson said in a statement on Wednesday.will also “post the text of a border security bill that includes the core elements of HR 2, subject to separate rules that allow for amendments.”
The process for the initial voting maneuver, known as MIRV, is complex. But ultimately, the national security wish list of Washington hawks and the administration will need to be consolidated before being sent to the Senate as a single package.
The process for the second ruse is less complicated. This is a simple betrayal of the people’s demands for a secure border, combined with what one Republican official called a “slap on the head.”
The problem is that Democrats don’t want to pass border security. The White House recognizes that invading the South is a serious political responsibility, but the administration fears left-wing activists within the party more than it fears ordinary voters. So the only way for Republicans to protect the border was to tie it to their other biggest concerns, but thanks to Johnson’s deal, that strategy no longer works.
Why Prime Minister Johnson ignored his promise
This is not the expected development. I heard that border security is a top priority for the new chairman. For example, in a meeting with administration officials in the White House Situation Room, Prime Minister Johnson laid out “two key preconditions: border security and significant answers regarding the funding requested.”
We know this because he wrote it down Letter of December 5th He reiterated the Republican position to one of the participants in the October meeting.
Making border security a prerequisite for foreign aid was one of the Speaker’s first promises and was repeated throughout his first months in office. Border security is also one of the Republican Party’s top promises, repeated by candidates and politicians from the Rio Grande to Montana.
More than that, poll rear poll, from new mexico to Massachusetts, Illegal immigration is a top concern for voters. But Washington, D.C., could be a laggard behind Ukraine, Israel, Gaza, Sudan and all the other places where the $95 billion in taxpayer funds that Mr. Johnson is proposing to send overseas will go. There is.
So what has changed?
One is Iran’s attack on Israel. It was part of a broader response, and no one was killed, but the audacity with which Iran responded itself (instead of using a number of proxies) appealed to Republican hawks eager to free military funding from U.S. security. They provided ammunition and support. against Democratic politicians targeted by anti-Israel and pro-Hamas activists.
Another is that Russia’s continued pressure on Ukraine has scared nervous members of both parties. “I think we’re already seeing the battlefield situation start to shift a little bit in Russia’s favor,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin told the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee on Wednesday.
Russians have an advantage over Ukrainians in “munition…vehicles” [and] …platform,” agreed Charles Q. Brown, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
SCIF panic
And finally, there is the SCIF (“Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility”). Here, America’s intelligence community shares secret information with members of Congress, who cannot see it or repeat it outside of the SCIF.
On Tuesday, the Republican chairman and his Democratic colleague on the House Intelligence Committee issued a joint statement, citing a secret meeting, saying they would not allow Ukraine to secure border security even at the cost of losing all leverage over the administration. It confirmed the urgent need to send money to the country, he said. .
“Today, at a secret conference.” they wrote“The Committee was informed this week of the critical need to provide military assistance to Ukraine.”
This wasn’t the first time Intel Committee Chairman Mike Turner (R-Ohio) has been confused at a secret press conference. In February, he left SCIF too unsteadily, causing a temporary panic about Russia’s new secret weapon, statement White House and Senate counterparts said this to calm everyone down.
Johnson is also known to dabble in SCIF. “When I became a speaker,” he said told reporters On April 10, “I went to SCIF and received a classified briefing from a different perspective to understand the need for FISA Section 702 and how important it is to national security.” It gave me a different perspective.”
These types of meetings are almost certainly responsible for the chairman’s reversal of increased taxpayer support for the Ukraine war.
“Anyone who has spent any time in Washington, D.C., knows that classified intelligence briefings at SCIF are just the reins.”Tucker Carlson Said In last week’s post. “It’s a collar chained around your neck, and there’s a handler on the other end telling you that if you don’t follow the program, the American will die.”
What’s interesting is that while wars overseas often involve pressure, deaths at home rarely do. But in Washington, that pressure is relentlessly one-sided.
And time and time again, we see the results play out the same way. War parties get what they want, embezzlers spend what they want, and the latest tax bill is always passed. But what are the concerns of the American public? An invasion of the southern border? Take a number ticket and stand in line. Maybe next year. (But probably not.)
