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South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham on Tuesday introduced a plan to boost funding for immigration enforcement agencies, setting up a vote with Democrats as Republicans move to advance the measure through the Senate.
The proposal aims to provide funding for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the U.S. Border Patrol through the reconciliation process, which requires only a simple majority. Republicans hold a 53-47 advantage in the chamber.
“Republicans are doing something that must be done quickly and that our Democrat colleagues are trying to prevent us from doing,” Graham, who chairs the Senate Budget Committee, said in a statement.
“That something is simple: fully fund Border Patrol and ICE at a time of great threat to the United States,” he added.
The effort follows a June 1 deadline set by President Donald Trump to secure funding for the agencies.
Under the plan, the Senate Judiciary Committee and the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee would draft legislation to carry out the funding. The resolution sets a ceiling of $70 billion for each committee’s portion.
Republicans are seeking to fund the agencies for up to 3.5 years, according to CBS News reporting.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said he would have preferred a bipartisan approach through the traditional appropriations process.
“I really regret that the Democrats have forced us down this path because, in my view, the appropriations process is one of the — maybe not many but at least few — things that we ought to be able to do around here in a bipartisan way,” Thune told reporters, according to the report.
The measure is expected to move to the House if it passes the Senate.
The debate comes amid a funding standoff affecting the Department of Homeland Security, which has been partially shut down since February. Previous bipartisan efforts to fund the department without including immigration enforcement agencies failed to gain approval in both chambers.
