Trump lays out options to GOP on immigration
Compromise, or instead steamroll Democrats
WHITE SULPHUR SPRINGS, W. Va. – President Trump told congressional Republicans on Thursday that they might have to compromise with Democrats to get a deal done on immigration.
Or, he said, Republicans could work to increase their majority in the midterm elections, so “we don’t have to compromise so much.”
Trump’s speech at a Republican retreat set the tone for the strategy going into negotiations over the fate of the “DREAMers,” undocumented immigrants who grew up in the USA but could face deportation beginning March 5 if Congress doesn’t give them legal status. Last year, Trump canceled an Obama-era program that protected them, called Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, and challenged Congress to come up with legislation to allow them to stay.
“We’re getting very little help from the Democrats, but I hope after I leave this room, we’re going to get a call from these people saying, ‘Let’s go,’ ” he said. “Or we have to elect many more Republicans. That’s another way of doing it.”
At his State of the Union Address on Tuesday, the president lauded the virtues of bipartisanship. “Tonight, I am extending an open hand to work with members of both parties, Democrats and Republicans,” to pass an immigration bill, Trump said.
Thursday morning, Trump emerged from a one-day Twitter hiatus to blame Democrats for obstructing progress on immigration.
“March 5th is rapidly approaching and the Democrats are doing nothing about DACA. They Resist, Blame, Complain and Obstruct - and do nothing. Start pushing Nancy Pelosi and the Dems to work out a DACA fix, NOW!” Trump tweeted Thursday morning.
Trump insists that any immigration bill that reaches his desk must have four components: legal status for DREAMers with a path to citizenship in 10 to 12 years; $25 billion for border security; limits to family-based reunification, which he calls “chain migration”; and an end to the diversity visa lottery system, which gives preferences to immigrants from African, Eastern European and Asian countries.
That proposal — designed to win Democratic votes in the Senate, which must meet a 60-vote threshold to withstand a filibuster — is less popular in the Republican-controlled House. Conservative members want the other provisions but object to citizenship for the 1.8 million childhood arrivals.