Border proposal is a starting point, but work remains

Question is, can Congress find a middle ground with compromise, or will this stall too?

On Sunday, U.S. senators released a $118 billion package that includes funding for the U.S. border. But don’t get too excited.

Within hours, House Speaker Mike Johnson said on social media the legislation would be “dead on arrival” if it reaches the House.

It’s yet another frustrating example of our elected officials’ lack of willingness to work together – and the bill hasn’t even made it to the House yet.

According to the Associated Press, “the proposal would overhaul the asylum system with faster and tougher enforcement, as well as give presidents new powers to immediately expel migrants if authorities become overwhelmed with the number of people applying for asylum. The new bill would also invest in U.S. defense manufacturing, send $14 billion in military aid to Israel, steer nearly $5 billion to allies in the Asia-pacific, and provide humanitarian assistance to civilians caught in conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza.”

“The bill would allot $20 billion to immigration enforcement, including the hiring of thousands of new officers to evaluate asylum claims and hundreds of Border Patrol agents, as well as funding local governments that have seen influxes of migrants,” the AP reports.

In Yuma, we especially like the attention to local governments. It’s long overdue.

Senators have been working on the compromise for months, and it’s important to note that the Senate’s top Republican, Sen. Mitch Mcconnell, and its top Democrat, Sen. Chuck Schumer, worked closely together to craft the bill.

That’s something we don’t see very often, and we applaud their efforts.

But it’s frustrating that the bill hasn’t even made it out of the Senate yet, and the House speaker is already thumbing his nose at it.

Life is about compromise and balance. Both sides don’t always get what they want, but instead, they find a middle ground. We feel like this is Life 101 – a lesson any adult should know, and one that most children learn on the playground pretty early on.

This legislation is a step forward, and a starting point for further negotiations – and that’s something we need to see both in the Senate and in the House.

According to the AP, Schumer plans to schedule a “key test vote” on the legislation in the Senate on Wednesday, so we’ll see what happens. Fingers crossed that we see forward progress, a willingness to reach a compromise, and no obstructionist behavior.

Unsigned editorials represent the viewpoint of this newspaper rather than an individual. Columns and letters to the editor represent the viewpoints of the persons writing them and do not necessarily represent the views of the Yuma Sun.