House Democrats urge Senate to advance Biden border security request

One of the largest Democratic caucuses in the House is urging the Senate to advance a border security bill reflecting the supplemental request made by President Joe Biden in order to address illegal immigration and the smuggling of fentanyl at the southern border.

The New Democrat Coalition sent a letter to all four congressional leaders — Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) — on Friday, urging a swift passage for border-related legislation. The letter comes one week after Biden sent a supplemental request to Congress to hire additional law enforcement personnel and implement stronger security at the border.

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“Border communities can’t wait any longer — they need the federal government to step up,” Rep. Greg Stanton (D-AZ), chairman of the NDC Immigration and Border Security Task Force, said in a statement. “The President’s request directs unprecedented resources to secure the border and crack down on deadly fentanyl. New Dems stand ready to reach across the aisle to get it done.”

The $13.6 billion request would go toward hiring 1,300 Border Patrol agents as well as 375 new immigration judge teams and 1,600 asylum officers to address “the significant backlog straining our immigration courts that has severely delayed resolutions,” the letter states. The request also includes $1.4 billion to go toward the Shelter and Services Program, which reimburses local governments and nonprofit organizations that provide resources to released immigrants.

Funding would also go toward hiring 1,000 officers focused on stopping the flow of fentanyl into the United States, with the letter citing a nearly 200% increase in fentanyl- and other opioid-related deaths over the last decade.

“Securing our nation’s southern border is a bipartisan goal, and the shared responsibility of all members of Congress,” the letter states. “We ask that you swiftly bring this important package to a vote in the Senate.”

It’s not yet clear whether Republicans would be willing to back the supplemental request, with several GOP lawmakers in both the House and Senate having criticized Biden for linking the border funding with aid packages for Israel and Ukraine. That could doom its chances in the closely divided Senate, where Democrats would need at least nine Republicans to overcome the legislative filibuster and bring it to the floor for a vote.

“We’re going to go over it with a fine-tooth comb,” McConnell said on Tuesday. “As you can see, there’s a lot of passion among our members about having a credible border security provision in there, and we’re going to make other changes as well.”

Other Senate Republicans said they would need to see stronger policy changes from the Biden administration in exchange for their support on the supplemental.

“That supplemental the Biden administration proposed — that is a joke,” Sen. Steve Daines (R-MT) said. “It is not about throwing more money at the border. We’ve got to slow the flow. It’s about changing policies. They don’t need a lot more money at the border. They’ve got to change the policies to remove the incentives to come across the border.”

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Even if the bill did manage to pass the Senate, its chances are unclear in the Republican-led House.

It’s likely GOP leaders in the lower chamber would instead push to make changes to the supplemental request that more closely align with their border security bill that passed earlier this year but hasn’t been taken up for consideration in the Senate, and Biden has threatened to veto if it ever made it to his desk.