For years, Republicans have professed fury over a crisis at the US-Mexico border. For months, many in the GOP have insisted they could only support further aid to Ukraine if it was paired with tougher border security measures to address that crisis.
So President Joe Biden accepted their conditions, giving up Democrats’ longtime demands on immigration and conceding much of what the right wanted — and as recently as Monday, a bipartisan deal seemed near.
But now, Republicans may be backing out. Not because of the substance of the deal, but because it might hurt Donald Trump’s chances of retaking the White House.
That’s what Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell told Republican senators in a closed-door meeting, according to Jake Sherman of Punchbowl News, saying “the politics” had put them “in a quandary.”
“When we started this, the border united us and Ukraine divided us,” McConnell said, per Sherman. But, he went on, “The politics on this have changed.” The issue is that “the nominee” — Trump — wants to campaign on immigration. “We don’t want to do anything to undermine him.”
Some pro-deal senators pushed back on how these remarks were reported Thursday, claiming McConnell wasn’t affirmatively declaring the talks dead or separating the two issues. Sen. Mitt Romney (R-UT) said instead that McConnell was “ambiguous” about a path forward.
But it’s clear what McConnell was alluding to: that Trump wants there to be chaos at the border while Biden is president, because he thinks such chaos will help defeat the incumbent. Trump does not want congressional Republicans making a deal with Biden to address the actual substantive problem because that would make Biden look good.
Romney confirmed that interpretation. “The border is a very important issue for Donald Trump,” he told reporters Thursday. “And the fact that he would communicate to Republican senators and congresspeople that he doesn’t want us to solve the…
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