The Democrat attempt to add amnesty to the multi-trillion-dollar infrastructure package may be the dumbest idea in the history of the White House and Senate, Sen. Lindsey Graham told Fox News' "The Ingraham Angle."
The South Carolina Republican said that President Joe Biden’s desire to put amnesty in the Democrat infrastructure bill "will lead to an invasion of illegal immigration; it will put jet fuel on a system that is already broken. If you give one person legal status there will be a run on our border like you have never seen before … the dumbest idea in the history of the Senate, the history of the White House. It will lead to the breakdown of law and order beyond what you see today."
Graham also accused Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer of attempting to scuttle onging talks over the bipartisan infrastructure bill by scheduling an inital test vote before the legislation has been finalized, saying "we’re not going to proceed to a bill that’s not written, because that makes no sense."
Schumer on Monday filed cloture on a motion to proceed to debate on the $1.2 trillion package, with one of the lead Republican negotiators, Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, slamming Schumer for setting an "arbitrary deadline" of Wednesday to conclude writing the bill, the New York Post reported.
Graham told "The Ingraham Angle" that "Schumer’s trying to blow this effort up. Filing cloture on a bill that doesn’t exist is insane," adding that Biden should "get on the phone to Schumer and tell him to stand down."
Graham added that Biden should "Tell him that ‘You’re undercutting an effort to find common ground on infrastructure regarding roads, bridges and ports.' You can tell Schumer to stop. Whether he will or not, I don’t know, but you should at least try to stop them from blowing this up."
Even if the bill passes the Senate, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has said she won’t bring it up for a vote until Schumer forces through a $3.5 trillion spending package via reconciliation, which only needs 51 Senate votes, according to the New York Post.
Graham called the larger measure a "power grab," saying it has nothing to do with infrastructure.
Top Senate Democrats have made it clear they want immigration reform included in the budget plan, because they consider the issue as part of infrastructure, with California Sen. Alex Padilla quoted by KQED, a public radio station for the Bay Area, as saying that "Citizenship is essential infrastructure for immigrant families. For many, it’s a gateway to a driver’s license, to health care, to higher education."
White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that the White House will "let Senate leaders put out the specifics in the reconciliation bill. We certainly support … using the reconciliation package as a platform and a forum for moving immigration protections forward, but we’ll let leaders in Congress speak to what’s included."
Brian Freeman ✉
Brian Freeman, a Newsmax writer based in Israel, has more than three decades writing and editing about culture and politics for newspapers, online and television.
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