The White House fleshed out its latest offer on immigration enforcement practices Friday night at a bipartisan meeting with senators, as lawmakers scramble to find a compromise that would end a partial shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security.
After a roughly one-hour meeting with White House “border czar” Tom Homan, senior GOP appropriators said the administration built upon an offer it had detailed in a letter earlier this week.
Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, R-Maine, said the administration “added” to its offer, while declining to provide specifics.
But there was no immediate indication that the White House was ready to yield on two major sticking points that are priorities for Democrats: requiring immigration agents to remove their masks and to obtain judicial warrants to enter private property.
The White House proposal, as outlined in the earlier letter, called for expanding the use of body-worn cameras by immigration agents, limiting enforcement at certain “sensitive” locations such as schools and hospitals, as well as mandating that agents wear visible identification, among other items.
Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., a senior appropriator involved in the talks, said the White House fleshed out the offer in “more detail” and provided legislative text on the proposals.
Democratic lawmakers offered no immediate comment to reporters upon leaving the meeting, the second of its kind in as many days.
A Democratic source familiar with the talks described the meeting as productive, but added that “there’s a ways to go to secure the significant reforms that Democrats have laid out for weeks and that are necessary to earn the support of the Democratic caucus.”
Republicans are calling on Democrats to release a counterproposal in coming days, as leaders look to strike a deal before Congress is set to leave for a two-week recess next weekend.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., has already threatened to keep senators in session during the scheduled recess if lawmakers cannot reach an agreement before then.
“I think there’s a range of solution or agreement that could be found there if both sides are willing to get there,” Thune said of the remaining obstacles, while calling Homan’s involvement in bipartisan talks “very, very helpful.”
“I think that he’s working hard to find that landing spot,” Thune said before the Friday night meeting.
Thune earlier described warrants and masks as the two biggest sticking points, though he pointed out that Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla. — President Donald Trump’s nominee for Homeland Security secretary — gave some ground on warrants during his confirmation hearing this week.
Mullin told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee that “judicial warrants will be used to go into houses, into place of businesses unless we’re pursuing someone that enters in that place.”
