WASHINGTON -- Georgia Republican Sens. Johnny Isakson and David Perdue opposed a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security for the rest of the year without preconditions about the Obama administration's immigration action, but it passed the Senate with room to spare.
Meanwhile, House Republicans are not sure they have the votes to pass a clean three-week stopgap, as planned. House Democrats say the Senate bill is the only version they will take.
Funding for the department -- which oversees Border Security, the Transportation Safety Administration and other areas -- expires at midnight. Most of the agency's workers would stay on the job and its functions would continue in a shutdown, but they would not be paid. There are 5,247 DHS employees in Georgia, according to federal data.
Isakson said his objection to this morning's vote came mostly on procedural grounds. He did not like how Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell -- who caved after weeks of Democratic filibusters -- put a clean bill on the floor under a system called "filling the tree" that does not allow amendments. Republicans denounced such maneuvers by Democratic Leader Harry Reid in recent years.
"I don’t want to make all these speeches about filling the tree and then participate in filling up the tree on an issue like this," Isakson said.
Isakson also said he wanted to first pass a separate bill to strike back at Obama's recent immigration actions before voting to fund DHS. Democrats filibustered the immigration bill this morning, saying they would block debate on it until DHS is funded for the year.
Perdue blamed Democrats for blocking a House-passed bill that would have funded DHS while preventing President Barack Obama from providing deportation relief for up to 5 million immigrants here illegally. That policy is on hold for now as the result of a ruling by a federal judge in Texas.
"My first priority is the Constitution, and I think this president, as backed up by a court in Texas, is violating the Constitution. I don't think we can allow that to stand, that's first and foremost. I voted five times to fund the DHS. And this is the thing that drives people crazy back home, that we end up in this situation."
Isakson said he could support a three-week stopgap bill, though Perdue said he did not want to commit to anything until he saw what the House could pass. His words were prescient: Minutes later, word started to filter in that House leaders were delaying a vote on a three-week DHS bill because conservatives were balking.
A spokesman for Rep. Doug Collins, R-Gainesville, said Collins was undecided.
Rep. Lynn Westmoreland, R-Coweta County, said he wants a one-week bill to put the pressure on the Senate to go to a conference committee with the House:
"I think we need to give some time for the courts to do it. As long as the courts are holding this up, then I think we need to fund DHS."
Rep. Rick Allen, R-Evans, said he was on board with the three-week plan because it will allow lawmakers to go home for recess next month and talk with their constituents about it:
"I want to be able to go into the district and talk about this, because the messaging is all wrong on this. The courts are with us, the president has overreached on immigration. We had a very good bill. The Senate for whatever reason couldn't even get a vote on it. We've got to give them more time."
But is that really going to change in three weeks?
"This place changes every day. I tell you. The phones start ringing, and so on and so forth. Bottom line is, we're still in the fight. You don't give up the fight."
Rep. Hank Johnson, D-Lithonia, maintained that the only way out for Republicans is a full-year clean bill. He and his fellow Democrats don't plan to allow anything else:
"The House Republicans are going to have to understand, as the Senate Republicans have done, and that is, let's not hold up homeland security funding to play politics with immigration. Let's not do that. They cannot win that. They're not going to win that battle, so why postpone the inevitable? Let's bite the bullet, do the clean bill that the Senate will be sending over to us."
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