A cheer broke out on the House floor among Republicans after their border security spending bill that is grounded in racism passed.
The bill passed 223-189 with four Republicans voting no, and one Democrat voting yes.
House Republicans broke out some of their moldy oldies. They claimed that the president has failed to lead on the crisis on the border. Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) accused the president and the Senate of not doing their jobs.
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Republicans repeated the same line over and over again that the House was working on a solution while the Senate hasn’t passed anything. What the Republicans left out was the reason why the Senate didn’t pass anything. The Senate bill that would have provided $2.7 billion in funding failed when Republicans blocked it. House Judiciary Committee chairman Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-VA) claimed that President Obama’s immigration policies have caused this crisis.
Democratic Minority Whip Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-MD) accused Republicans of taking two bad bills and making them worse. Hoyer suggested that what the House was doing was nothing. He said the bill will not pass and will not solve the problem. Hoyer said that the bill was brought to the floor in near secrecy.
Before the vote, Rep. Luis Gutiérrez (D-IL) said, “For weeks … they have said that they are disease-ridden, lice-filled, gang bangers, drug dealers mules of the drug cartels who have come here in hoards to invade our nation, and now they are demonstrating that that’s how they feel in their legislation.”
Earlier today, President Obama made his disdain clear for the House Republican stunt, “This is a message bill that they couldn’t quite pull off yesterday, so they made it a little more extreme so maybe they can pass it today. Just so they can check a box before they leave town tomorrow.”
House Republicans cheered after it was announced that the bill passed. They could have been cheering their legislative accomplishment, or most likely, the laziest Congress in history was cheering because they can now go on vacation for five weeks.
While the Republicans were cheering millions of Hispanic Americans were getting the message that Republicans don’t like them. Republicans don’t want them in the country and that racism rules the day in the GOP.
The border spending bill gave money to border enforcement based on the Republicans favorite race based scare tactic that the border is not secure. The rationale behind this bill was based on playing to racists in their party.
House Republicans were cheering while all around them their party burned.
Jason is the managing editor. He is also a White House Press Pool and a Congressional correspondent for PoliticusUSA. Jason has a Bachelor’s Degree in Political Science. His graduate work focused on public policy, with a specialization in social reform movements.
Awards and Professional Memberships
Member of the Society of Professional Journalists and The American Political Science Association
