Washington Post Editorial: Republicans Holding 'Security Hostage to Immigration'

February 2, 2015
Blog Post
With 26 days until the Department of Homeland Security shuts down, Speaker Boehner and the GOP obstruction is taking our nation down a dangerous path that threatens our safety and leaves families at risk.  From Washington Post Editorial Board:

GOP holds security hostage to immigration

How far will Republicans in Congress take their reckless flirtation with undermining government this time?  Will they, as seems increasingly likely, fail to pass a bill that the president can sign ensuring adequate funding for the Department of Homeland Security and its 280,000 employees before the agency's support expires Feb. 27?  Are they ready to let funding lapse…?

A number of prominent Republican lawmakers clearly believe that denying funding to the nation's premier organ of domestic security is no big deal, as long as the move expresses the GOP's anger about President Obama's executive actions on immigration….As Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-Fla.) put it to Politico: Letting the department's funding lapse would not be "the end of the world."

Mr. Diaz-Balart's complacency may come as news to Americans concerned about the risk of terrorism in the wake of attacks in Paris, Ottawa, Sydney and elsewhere.  It certainly came as news to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh C. Johnson, as well as his three predecessors — Democrat Janet Napolitano and Republicans Michael Chertoff and Tom Ridge — all of whom have warned GOP lawmakers not to conflate essential funding for the department with the political fight over immigration.

House Republicans were deaf to such appeals.  Last month, they passed a bill furnishing the department with $40 billion in funding through September, the end of the current budget year.  But they attached provisions to that bill, certain to draw a presidential veto, that would kill the administration's plan to temporarily protect several million undocumented immigrants from deportation and repeal a program, in force since 2012, that offers a similar shield to people brought here illegally as children…That is as irresponsible as it is politically ill advised.

On Friday, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R- Ky.) announced the body would consider the House bill this week, a sign that the GOP is persisting with its game of chicken…there is no shortage of Republican lawmakers who would rather try to antagonize the president than carry out the workaday task of funding the government.

In the absence of a bill, the department's funding lapses in less than a month.  What happens in the intervening weeks will indicate whether Republicans are more interested in gamesmanship or governance.

If Republicans fail to pass a DHS funding bill, then front-line security personnel will continue to work without pay, including:

  • More than 40,000 Border Patrol agents and Customs and Border Patrol officers

  • More than 50,000 TSA aviation security screeners

  • More than 13,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement law enforcement agents and officers

  • More than 40,000 active duty Coast Guard military members

  • More than 4,000 Secret Service law enforcement agents and officers

Americans have seen enough of Republicans' obstruction, dysfunction and distraction.  Our country cannot afford another reckless GOP-manufactured crisis – pass a clean DHS bill now.