'Americans are ticked off that this is not resolved.' Lankford speaks after bipartisan border bill fails in Senate
Despite a plea from Oklahoma's James Lankford to "do something" about historic levels of illegal immigration at the southern border, the U.S. Senate effectively killed any hope for a solution before November's presidential election.
The bipartisan border security bill needed 60 votes to advance but couldn't muster 50.
Lankford, a Republican, and other members of the Senate have worked for months crafting a bill that Democrats, who control the Senate and White House, would allow to reach the floor.
"Cities around the country have said do something. Make this stop," Lankford said during a speech Wednesday on the Senate floor.
The number of encounters with illegal immigrants at the U.S.-Mexico border has risen sharply since 2020; December saw the highest number of encounters of any month in history. As negotiators neared a compromise in recent weeks, however, immigration and border politics imploded.
'We have to sit down together and solve it'
During a nearly half-hour speech on the Senate floor that one colleague described as one of the most important speeches of the past decade, Lankford described a conversation he had with a popular commentator four weeks ago. The commentator, whom Lankford did not identify, hadn't yet read the bill.
"(They) told me flat out, 'If you try to move a bill that solves the border crisis during this presidential year, I will do whatever I can to destroy you,'" Lankford said. "They have been faithful to their promise and have done everything they can to destroy me in the past several weeks."
In his speech, Lankford appealed to the deliberative and policy-oriented nature of the Senate, which is usually more insulated from wild swings in political rhetoric than the boisterous U.S. House of Representatives. But in this Congress, there is no solid majority on either side of the aisle. The House has a two-vote GOP majority, while Democrats control the Senate by one vote.
"That means if we're going to solve something, we have to sit down together and solve it. That's how it works when you make law," he said. "You can do press conferences without the other side, but you can't make law without the other side in the United States Senate."
Sen. James Lankford had bipartisan support, but no support from Donald Trump
Lankford has worked with Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy, of Connecticut, and Arizona independent Sen. Kyrsten Sinema to craft the legislation, which has key support from both President Joe Biden and the National Border Patrol Council, a union that represents the nation's Border Patrol agents.
But he didn't have support from Donald Trump, whose campaign for president has highlighted the surge of immigration in recent months. Senate GOP Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Kentucky, acknowledged privately to other Republican senators recently that Trump's opposition to the bipartisan deal being brokered now puts the party in a dilemma.
More: EDITORIAL: Lankford leadership in border efforts deserves applause, not censure
It certainly puts any immediate improvement of the border situation in jeopardy.
The demise of a bipartisan border deal would deny Biden the chance to claim a victory in addressing surging migration at the southern border — a topic that Republicans have hammered Biden over throughout his presidency. It also would let Trump continue his political attacks on border policies and immigration.
Oklahoma's other GOP senator, Markwayne Mullin, voted against the motion to advance the bill to a final vote in the Senate.
During his speech, Lankford described what the massive and highly technical bill would do:
- Restarts border wall construction in locations identified by the Trump administration
- Adds 50,000 detention beds and doubles deportation flights
- Adds money for DNA testing and local law enforcement
- Boosts immigration staffing and judges
- Purchases of equipment to detect fentanyl
- Strengthens sanction authority to garget cartels
- Strengthens standards of evidence for asylum claims, allowing officials to quickly deport those who don't qualify
- Allows officials to close the border to migrants if encounters reach 5,000 per day
That last point is one of the most misconstrued aspects of the bill. Some conservative pundits have said the bill allows a stream of 5,000 people across the border each day. That argument is absurd, Lankford said.
Under the bill, Border Patrol would detain and screen the first 5,000 migrants for possible entry. If there is a surge, however, all migrants would be detained and deported until the backlog is addressed. The U.S. currently sees well more than 5,000 encounters a day, so it's likely that passing the bill would immediately shut down the border to new migrants.
"What's been told has been false, day after day. I've had a few folks that have said, 'If I can't get everything, I want nothing.' I don't find most Americans are that way in their day-to-day life," Lankford said. "Americans are ticked off that this is not resolved, and they expect us to get things done. So why don't we do that?"
Although receiving the support of Oklahoma's Republican Rep. Tom Cole, and Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt, a former Republican state senator, Lankford has faced political attacks from his own party back home. In an unusual and controversial move, some members of the Oklahoma Republican Party met to censure Lankford for his work on the border package, although the state party chair, Nathan Dahm, later criticized the meeting as illegal and said the censure was not the party's official position.