While conflating the border with the military and declaring his displeasure for the $1.3 trillion Omnibus spending package, President Donald Trump signed the bill Friday to avoid a looming government shutdown.
While conflating the border with the military and declaring his displeasure for the $1.3 trillion Omnibus spending package, President Donald Trump signed the bill Friday to avoid a looming government shutdown.
“I will never sign another bill like this again,” Trump said after tweeting early on Friday that he was considering a veto. “Nobody read it. It’s only hours old.”
Two things he was happy about, though, were the $1.6 billion related to the border wall, as well as adding “large numbers of immigration judges.”
Trump wants to stop “drugs from flowing over our borders by having a strong border system, including a wall,” he said. “We are in a position, militarily, which is very advantageous.”
Trump then called Defense Secretary James Mattis to the lectern inside the White House Diplomatic Reception Room to talk about military gains.
Once Mattis concluded, Trump talked further about border security and the wall.
“We’re starting work on, literally, Monday,” Trump said.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen said “this is a down payment on a border wall system.”
“I will say, however, that Congress chose not to listen to the men and women of DHS,” Nielsen, who has visited the Valley twice in the last 14 months, said. “They told us where to build the wall and how to build the wall.”
The bill calls for 25 miles of wall funding in Hidalgo County and 8 miles in Starr County. It includes language preventing those funds from being used to deploy barriers in the Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge, which was originally slated by the Trump Administration as the starting point for the wall.
Rep. Filemon Vela, D-Brownsville, who voted against the bill, called the refuge’s omission a “major consolation,” but was not pleased with the hundreds of millions of dollars appropriated for wall funding in the Valley.
“To me, it’s astonishing that any Democrat would vote for a nickel of funding for any wall whatsoever,” Vela said.
Rep. Vicente Gonzalez, D-McAllen, also voted against the bill. Voting in favor were Reps. Henry Cuellar, D-Laredo, and Beto O’Rourke, D-El Paso. The bill passed the House on Thursday by a vote of 256-167.
The Senate passed the bill on Friday by a vote of 65-32. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, voted in favor of the bill while U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, voted against it.
Cornyn immediately praised portions of the bill, including border security. He pointed out the “replacement and upgrade of existing primary fencing along the entire U.S.-Mexico border; additional border security technology for situational awareness; and prevents funds from being used to deploy barriers in Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge.”
Cruz on Thursday said in a statement that the bill “fails to provide sufficient funds to properly secure our border, let alone build the wall that is necessary.”
Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals, however, did not received protections in the bill they were hoping for.
“I do want the Hispanic community to know and the DACA recipients to know that the Republicans are much more on your side than the Democrats, who are using you for their own purposes,” Trump said.
Vela tweeted at Trump after he signed the bill, “If you like DACA recipients so much, rescind your DACA ORDER! #DREAMActNow”
Trump ended the DACA program in September.
