Congress came to a temporary spending agreement to tend the government shutdown earlier this week (contingent upon a future DACA deal), but this didn’t end well for President Trump because Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer later took the border wall funding offer “off the table.” This has now led to the White House dropping a new proposal for a “path to citizenship” for not only the so-called “Dreamers” (those undocumented immigrants brought to America as children) but a total of 1.8 million existing undocumented immigrants. The proposal, of course, also contains some big demands for Democrats.
CNN reports that the White House has branded this as a “dramatic concession” that includes a requirement for $25 billion in border wall funding, along with a promised crackdown on illegal immigration. The New York Times adds that the White House administration calls it a “take-it-or-leave-it proposal,” which would allow Dreamers (about 690,000 of them) to become citizens if they don’t run afoul of the law for 10-12 years. Supposedly, this would also apply to another 1.1 million undocumented immigrants who either didn’t apply for the DACA program or did not qualify. In exchange, the White House wants this:
Congress would have to create a $25 billion trust fund to pay for a southern border wall, dramatically boost immigration arrests, speed up deportations, crack down on people who overstay their visas, prevent citizens from bringing their parents to the United States, and end a State Department program designed to encourage migration from underrepresented countries.
The plan was co-drafted by the White House’s most unhinged figure, senior advisor Stephen Miller. And apparently, it’s not an instant hit with either party, per the NY Times:
[T]he plan — drafted by Stephen Miller, the president’s hard-line domestic policy adviser and John Kelly, the White House chief of staff — was immediately rejected by Democrats, pro-immigration activists and some Republicans, with some describing it as nothing but a heartless attempt to rid the country of immigrants and slam shut the nation’s borders.
The Washington Post notes that some Senate Republicans are likely to push back hard (while claiming that it’s too lenient toward illegal immigration), and it sounds like this is not an offer that Congress can’t refuse. Will Trump ever see his mythical wall happen? It’s not looking good.
(Via CNN, New York Times & Washington Post)