#TSA screeners would remain on the job #withoutPay, many of whom called in sick as a #protest after a previous #shutdown dragged on for wks, sparking nationwide #travel delays.
It would also leave #Congress w/few alternate paths to fund the govt. A likely last resort would have been another #stopgap resolution to preserve existing #funding, potentially triggering #cuts to #defense spending.
McClintock's position means #Republicans are down another vote as they try to impeach Mayorkas w/a razor-thin House majority. Rep #KenBuck (R-CO) is also opposed, w/several other Republicans undecided.
After months of talks, Senate negotiators on Sunday released a sweeping #bipartisan border #security deal that is aimed at discouraging migrants from crossing the U.S.-Mexico border.
The $118B #NationalSecurity#legislation also includes billions of dollars in funding for Ukraine, Israel, the Indo-Pacific & humanitarian aid….
Even before seeing its contents, lawmakers on both the right — &, to a lesser extent, the left — flanks in #Congress have slammed the measure & #House#Speaker#MikeJohnson (R) called it “dead on arrival” in the chamber. #Trump, who has made the #border a core campaign issue, [& wants to keep it an unsolved issue] opposes the deal.
#Senate Majority Leader Chuck #Schumer (D) announced that he would hold the first procedural vote on the #legislation on Wed, leaving the bill’s boosters little time to sell its provisions. “Senators must shut out the noise from those who want this agreement to fail for their own #political agendas,” he said in a statement Sunday evening.
In a 6pg letter sent Tues to #Homeland#Security Cmte chairman Rep Mark Green, Mayorkas detailed his lengthy career & pushed back on the #GOP’s accusations that he has avoided their oversight….
“We have provided #Congress & your Cmte hrs of testimony, thousands of docs, hundreds of briefings, & much more info that demonstrates quite clearly how we are enforcing the #law.”
His responsiveness to the #House’s oversight requests would not waiver, however “baseless” the proceedings, he added. “I assure you that your false accusations do not rattle me & do not divert me from the #law enforcement & broader #PublicService to which I remain devoted,” #Mayorkas wrote.
…Constitutional experts & Dems have argued that #Republicans are abusing a tool adopted by the framers of the #Constitution to protect the country from despotic leadership to instead address a policy dispute. Two #law professors who testified before the cmte this month both stated that they did not see a constitutional basis for #impeachment.
While the #House has been trying to impeach #Mayorkas on baseless accusations, Mayorkas has been providing technical expertise to the #Senate for the bipartisan #immigration bill.
#Republican speaker of the #House#MikeJohnson told his lawmakers that an #immigration policy compromise under negotiation in the #Senate that is seen as crucial to getting military #aid to #Ukraine & #Israel approved is “absolutely dead” in his chamber, CNN’s Manu Raju reports.
The comment comes from #rightwing lawmaker Marjorie Taylor Greene, who has already rejected the measures that a #bipartisan group of senators are reportedly bargaining over.
(But reality check: #MikeJohnson said he doesn’t want to pass #BorderLegislation because he doesn’t want the Biden admin to be able to take credit for it & because he wants to keep the issue alive for the 2024 #election.)