Trump’s emergency could be a pivot point
McConnell: Wall saga could end in first veto
WASHINGTON – Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made clear to President Donald Trump that he has a choice: Move ahead with his declaration of a national emergency at the southern border and face a potential rebuke from his own party – or shift gears.
McConnell said Monday that the Senate is likely to pass a resolution to block Trump’s emergency declaration.
“I think what is clear in the Senate is there will be enough votes to pass the resolution of disapproval, which will
then be vetoed by the president,” McConnell told reporters in Kentucky. “And then, in all likelihood, the veto will be upheld in the House.”
Trump has threatened to veto the resolution if it reaches his desk. Even so, congressional approval of the measure would mark a turning point in his presidency. Not only would it be the first time Trump has issued a veto, it would put him at odds with members of his own party over how to deliver one of the cornerstone promises of his 2016 presidential campaign.
A possible way out
Republicans say that while they support Trump’s objective – building a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border – several have serious reservations about declaring a national emergency to free up billions of dollars for the structure. Some lawmakers also have raised concerns that Trump is taking money from key military programs to pay for the barrier.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is the latest GOP senator to voice objections to an emergency declaration. Paul said Saturday that approving the emergency declaration would be tantamount to giving “extra-constitutional powers to the president” – something he said he’s unwilling to do. “I can’t vote to give the president the power to spend money that hasn’t been appropriated by Congress,” Paul said, as reported by the Bowling Green Daily News.
Some House Republicans made the same argument last week, when 13 of them joined Democrats in voting to block Trump’s declaration, sending the measure to the Senate. McConnell has said the Senate will take up the measure by March 15.
Meanwhile, some GOP senators have been looking to give Trump a way out.
Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., who has called an emergency declaration “inconsistent with the U.S. Constitution,” offered an alternative last week.
Instead of declaring a national emergency, Alexander suggested, Trump could secure money for his border wall by tapping into money Congress already approved. Not only would that give Trump access to the money he wants, it could avoid litigation, Alexander said.
As the Senate vote approaches, several Republican senators said they’re still deciding how they will vote. Others support Trump, saying he’s doing what he needs to do to protect the nation’s borders.
“The president’s not exercising any power that Congress didn’t give him,” said Sen. John Kennedy, R-La. “Had Congress done its job instead of playing politics, he wouldn’t have to do it.”
Democrats, meanwhile, have complained Trump is trying to do an “end run around the Constitution.”
“This is a president who is grasping for power, and he has to be reigned in,” said New Mexico Sen. Tom Udall, who serves on the Senate Appropriations Committee.
Four crucial ‘no’ votes
Paul’s weekend announcement that he opposes the emergency declaration makes him the fourth Senate Republican who has said they will vote to stop it. His decision gives opponents the 51 votes they need to block Trump’s declaration.
The other three Republicans who have said they will vote to stop the declaration are Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.
“As a U.S. senator, I cannot justify providing the executive with more ways to bypass Congress,” Tillis wrote in an op-ed in The Washington Post. “As a conservative, I cannot endorse a precedent that I know future left-wing presidents will exploit to advance radical policies that will erode economic and individual freedoms.”
Tillis is up for re-election in 2020. Collins, who is also up for re-election next year, said she’s concerned about Trump using the declaration to repurpose billions of dollars that Congress has already appropriated.
It “strikes me as undermining the appropriations process, the will of Congress and of being of dubious constitutionality,” she said.
Collins, who is serving her fourth term, is a moderate Republican who sometimes breaks with her party on key issues, including health care. She criticized a federal judge’s ruling last December to overturn the Affordable Care Act, saying it was “too sweeping.”
Murkowski said she will support the resolution to block Trump’s emergency declaration.
Murkowski is up for re-election in 2022. She shocked the political world in 2010 when she waged a successful write-in campaign after losing her party’s primary. Murkowski has little allegiance to the national party that some say abandoned her during her reelection bid.
Murkowski was the only Republican to vote against Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh’s appointment. She voted “present” as a collegial gesture for her Republican colleague Sen. Steve Daines, who supported Kavanaugh but was attending his daughter’s wedding.
Murkowski has worked across the aisle on issues important to her state, including with former Democrat Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana on energy policies.
Murkowski, along with Collins, also voted against the confirmation of Betsy DeVos, Trump’s choice to head the Department of Education.
How did it fare in the House?
Despite concerns raised by some GOP lawmakers, only 13 broke ranks with the party and voted in favor of the Democratic backed resolution when it passed the House last week.
Several of them, including Reps. Will Hurd of Texas, Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania and Fred Upton of Michigan, are expected to run in competitive races in 2020.
Most Republicans voted along party lines and against the resolution, citing the need for more border security.