The United States Senate published the text of a long-awaited deal to enact border security reforms in exchange for aid to Ukraine on Sunday, marking the end of negotiations that had begun in December.
The 370-page bill — titled the Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2024 — would appropriate $118 billion to both provide aid to Ukraine during its war against Russia and Israel during its conflict with Hamas until Sept. 30, as well as fund border security reforms. The latter reforms include the hiring of new immigration judges to expedite the processing of asylum and deportation proceedings as well as law enforcement operations to detain and remove foreign nationals present illegally in the United States. (RELATED: Former Officials Attack Leaked Senate Border Deal, Say Biden Is Trying To Deflect Blame)
Emergency National Security Supplemental Appropriations Act, 2024 by Daily Caller News Foundation on Scribd
A key provision of the bill in Title IV is the creation of an emergency authority to summarily remove foreign nationals who enter the U.S. illegally, without standard removal proceedings under Title 8, if the week-long average of such entrants increases to over 5,000 persons per day. This summary removal requirement expires only once the two-week average number of illegal entries decreases to 3,750 persons per day.
This provision has proved to be controversial among Republicans, who responded to its disclosure ahead of the bill’s release and have argued that it will not meaningfully reduce illegal immigration. The bill imposes caps on the number of days in a calendar year that the emergency authority may be exercised.
“I never believed we should link policy demands to emergency aid for our allies, but Republicans insisted—so Democrats negotiated in good faith over many weeks and now there is a bipartisan deal on border policy legislation,” wrote Senate Appropriations Committee Patty Murray, who released the bill’s text. “Ukraine’s fate and so much more hangs in the balance—it’s time for Congress to act.”
This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
All content created by the Daily Caller News Foundation, an independent and nonpartisan newswire service, is available without charge to any legitimate news publisher that can provide a large audience. All republished articles must include our logo, our reporter’s byline and their DCNF affiliation. For any questions about our guidelines or partnering with us, please contact [email protected].