ICYMI: “Republicans Gamble on Border Politics,” Risk “Blame” if They “Walk Away From it.”

IN CASE YOU MISSED IT 

Washington Post: Republicans gamble on border politics
By Theodoric Meyer and Leigh Ann Caldwell
January 29, 2024

• The text of the most conservative bipartisan border security deal in decades is expected this week. 

• But former president Donald Trump’s campaign to kill the yet-to-be-released bill is already reverberating through the 2024 campaign — and putting Republicans between a rock and a hard place. Some Republicans… are following Trump’s lead in denouncing it. 

• Maybe Trump’s opposition to a deal leads Republicans to walk away from it. If that happens: “I think we know who to blame,” said Sen. Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), who represents a crucial swing state. “The person that orchestrates it and then the individuals that follow him.”

• On the other hand, if Congress manages to pass a border bill that President Biden signs into law, Biden and House and Senate Democrats can run on the accomplishment in November.

• “Republicans have put themselves in a position to lose the politics of this situation, no matter what happens next,” said one Democratic strategist working on Senate races, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to candidly discuss the politics of the issue.

• “There are some people that oppose the bill based on the presidential politics issue, rather than the crisis that’s actually occurring at the border,” Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who has spent months negotiating a package.

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