On a call with reporters this afternoon, a White House aide warned that President Obama’s security might be in jeopardy if Republicans failed to pass a full funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security.
“Until a full funding bill has passed, the DHS and the Secret Service is not able to move forward with the recent recommendations from the report on White House complex security,” Andrew Mayock from the Office of Management and Budget explained during the call.
Obama has vowed to veto the bill passed by the House this afternoon. Mayock said that the White House only supported the “base bill,” which funds the agency without limitations. The House version contains a number of amendments aimed at defunding Obama’s executive amnesty for illegal immigrants.
The Secret Service security report was drafted after a fence jumper breached security at the White House last year, making it inside the East Room before he was apprehended.
The report called for the replacement of the entire White House fence, making it four or five feet taller.
During the call Cecilia Muñoz, the White House Domestic Policy Director, denounced the bill passed by the House. She says the amendments didn’t make “any sense from a policy perspective.”
Muñoz insisted that the Republican amendments defunding Obama’s executive action were “not relevant” to the DHS bill and reminded reporters that the president would veto the bill if it passed in the Senate.
“There’s no reason to tinker with the executive actions at all,” she said.