The Republican Senate Chickens Out

With more than a dozen Republican senators publicly criticizing President Trump’s slush fund while Trump himself equivocated about whether he would kill it, the reconciliation bill was going to be a long-deferred day of reckoning. Trump needed the Senate to pass the bill to get ICE and other Department of Homeland Security outlays funded. The Senate was primed to pass an amendment providing that no federal funds could be used for Trump’s “Anti-Weaponization Fund,” which caught infuriated Republicans by surprise.

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But in the end, the Republican caucus went meekly along and approved the ICE funding, with no limits on the slush fund. One amendment after another was defeated. The Democrats’ much-hyped vote-a-rama, which was supposed to embarrass Republicans into voting to bar the slush fund, proved to be a fizzle. Though acting Attorney General Todd Blanche refused to put his commitment to end the fund in writing, Republicans nonetheless refused to write the ban into law.

Despite the unpopularity of the fund, and of Trump personally, after an all-night session the Senate approved a clean bill early Friday morning, with no amendments. The bill fully funds ICE and other immigration enforcement for three more years.

What on earth happened?

The key player was Republican Majority Leader John Thune. Though Thune has openly criticized many Trump actions and refused to do his bidding on several occasions, on this one Thune decided to work closely with the White House to fend off all amendments to the reconciliation measure. The alternative, Thune persuaded his caucus, was a legislative free-for-all, with Democrats splitting Republicans and Thune himself looking weak. The win for Trump was almost an incidental sideshow to Senate inside baseball, but it was a win nonetheless.

In a very carefully choreographed series of amendments, Thune OK’d negative votes by a small number of Republican senators who are vulnerable in November but persuaded other vocally critical Republicans to vote with the majority in order to deny Democrats a win.

On the key procedural amendment to send the immigration bill back to committee with instructions to add language that would block the slush fund, three vulnerable Republicans, Susan Collins of Maine, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, and Jon Husted of Ohio were allowed to vote with Democrats to kill the fund. But several others who have been bitterly critical of the fund were persuaded to vote with the leadership to avoid an open split, so that the amendment would fail.

They included three senators forced into retirement by Trump—Thom Tillis of North Carolina, Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, and John Cornyn of Texas, as well as Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, who is voluntarily retiring, and other critics who are not up this year such as John Curtis of Utah. Yet all gave up the leverage of blocking the fund, and all voted for the clean bill.

Tillis had initially said he wouldn’t support the legislation unless it included language to kill the fund. But he later explained that he was going along with the leadership strategy of protecting politically vulnerable colleagues, who will be whipsawed this fall between their need to retain MAGA votes but also hold onto independents. The fewer awkward anti-Trump amendments they are forced to support, the better. “I’m taking the cue from my colleagues that are in cycle [this year],” Tillis explained. “Whatever suits their purposes.”

One amendment after another was voted down. In the end, the only Republican to vote against the bill on final passage was Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

The larger fight to block the fund isn’t quite over. U.S. District Court Judge Leonie Brinkema, whose previous order temporarily enjoined the fund, has scheduled a hearing for June 12 to consider the fund’s legality. And the House still has to vote on the reconciliation measure.

So far, only one House Republican, Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick of Pennsylvania, has committed to voting to block the fund. Fitzpatrick has co-sponsored legislation with Democrat Tom Suozzi of New York that would prohibit federal funds from being used to pay any claims submitted to the fund. Others may follow.

The House is very closely divided, dozens of Republicans are vulnerable in November, and Speaker Mike Johnson is a far weaker leader than his Senate counterpart, John Thune. It’s still possible that the House could attach language to the reconciliation bill to kill the fund. Then the House and Senate would duke it out.

But the Senate cave-in is a window on Trump’s zombie power. In many respects, Trump is a dead man walking, yet his sway over Republicans persists.