Author of border bill says GOP is now 'saying the truth out loud' about why they killed it

28 September 2024

In late 2023 and early 2024, a bipartisan group of senators attempted to pass a bill aimed at curbing the number of illegal crossings on the Southern border. Now, one of the bill's authors is arguing that Republicans' concern about the border is disingenuous given their reason for blocking its passage.

On Friday, Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pennsylvania) remarked at a press conference that he didn't want Democrats to be able to "run on" what Sen. James Lankford (R-Oklahoma) called "the most conservative border security bill in four decades." Vice President Kamala Harris' official campaign X (formerly Twitter) account posted the video of Perry's remarks, in which he said Democrats would try to use the bill to claim credit for "22,000 border agents" and "41,500 detention beds."

"As the author of the bill, I didn't write it to give Democrats something to run on. I wanted to pass it and secure the border," Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut) tweeted in response to Perry's comments. "But at least Republicans are saying the truth out loud. They knew the bill would secure the border — so they killed it to help them politically."

Murphy's tweet echoes what Sen. Mitt Romney (R-Utah) said about the legislation in January, when he accused former President Donald Trump of torpedoing the bill in order to use the border as political fodder in his 2024 campaign. And Rep. Dan Crenshaw (R-Texas) has also expressed frustration with his party's refusal to pass a bill that would accomplish several immigration policy goals they all campaigned on.

Harris has also highlighted Trump's role in tanking the border bill on the campaign trail, including during her most recent visit to Arizona. The vice president visited the Southern border this week, and said her opponent was more concerned with "playing political games" than actually solving the problem.

"Donald Trump got word of the bill, realized it was going to fix a problem he wanted to run on, and told them to kill the bill, don’t put it up for a vote,” Harris said in an MSNBC interview. “He killed a bill that would have actually been a solution, because he wants to run on a problem, instead of fixing a problem.”

The former president has claimed credit for killing the bill during his own stump speeches, telling supporters they can "blame it on me" during a January campaign stop in Nevada. The legislation — which was co-authored by Murphy along with Lankford and Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (I-Arizona) — would have hired thousands of new border agents and given the president the authority to close the border altogether if illegal crossings topped a set weekly threshold. However, Republicans quickly mobilized against it after Trump suggested anyone who supported it would face a primary challenger.

Lankford, who is considered one of the most conservative members of the Senate Republican Conference, became a prime target for Republicans due to his work on the immigration bill. He noted in a floor speech that an unnamed conservative commentator threatened to "destroy" him for trying to address the border in an election year.

"[T]hey have been faithful to their promise and have done everything they can to destroy me in the past several weeks," Lankford said in February.

Earlier this summer, President Joe Biden passed an executive order imposing more stringent regulations on the asylum application process. That, combined with efforts by the Mexican government to curb illegal border crossings into the United States, has led to the lowest number of migrant apprehensions since 2021. Harris is running on passing the border bill if she is elected in November.

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