Like other members of the U.S. Senate, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia took part in a marathon overnight “vote-a-rama” session, eventually adopting a budget resolution related to immigration enforcement on a 50-48 party-line vote.
Two Republicans voted with Democrats against the measure — Sens. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Rand Paul of Kentucky.
The resolution serves as a blueprint for a future budget reconciliation bill that aims to provide roughly $70 billion in new funding for immigration enforcement, specifically for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, commonly called ICE, and Customs and Border Protection.
The vote-a-rama lasted about six hours and finished up around 3:30 a.m.
“We did stay up until almost four o’clock — so about 3:35 this morning — to complete something which is called the reconciliation bill, but basically it’s finally going to be funding Border Security and ICE,” Capito, R-W.Va., told reporters during a news briefing today.
“These are essential government entities that help with our Homeland Security to keep us safe. We see what happened at the border. We had four years of basically open borders. Now we have essentially the closed border with very little illegal immigration coming through, which is also lessened the amount of fentanyl and drugs coming through the border.”
The Senate rejected more than a dozen amendments during the session. Democrats used the process to force Republicans into difficult votes on affordability issues such as high energy prices, housing and healthcare costs.
After a series of clashes involving immigration enforcement officers in the interior of the United States this year, Democrats have demanded significant reforms to ICE and Border Patrol, focusing on accountability, limiting “roving patrols,” requiring judicial warrants for home entry, banning agent masks and mandating body cameras.
Capito, though, said “the Democrats just will not vote for law enforcement or and they are interested in keeping open borders. So we have taken problems that we see and tried to find a solution which is, which is funding these two agencies all the way for the next three and a half years.”
The budget resolution now moves to the House of Representatives to consider for adoption. “That will go to the house later today, and hopefully the house will pick it up and pass it rather quickly,” Capito said.
Once both chambers have adopted the blueprint, congressional committees will begin crafting the formal reconciliation package.
Republicans intend to use the reconciliation process to bypass a Democratic filibuster because it only requires a simple majority for passage.
“I am disappointed in my Democrat colleagues’ refusal to cooperate on a bipartisan level for the good of our country,” Capito said in a statement released by her office today.
“During a time when national security is critical, they have turned their backs on our nation’s law enforcement officers. Republicans will continue the fight to secure our border and enforce immigration laws that keep our nation out of harm’s way.”