Sen. Bill Hagerty ‘Hard No’ on ‘Illegal-Immigration Magnet’ Border Bill

Hagerty
Bill O'Leary -Pool/Getty Images
Bradley Jaye

Sen. Bill Hagerty (R-TN) will vote against the “unacceptable” pro-migration Senate border bill that “buy[s] off Democrat sanctuary city mayors,” he said in a blistering statement hours after the deal’s long-awaited but widely-panned reveal.

“The ‘border’ bill released tonight includes an eye-popping $1.4B for NGOs to resettle illegal aliens in your communities via airplane tickets and hotel rooms (nearly double the record amount from FY23), including $933M available immediately without conditions,” Hagerty posted on X. “This is more of our tax dollars being used to buy off Democrat sanctuary city mayors. This is the ‘border security’ Democrats really want.

“Mayorkas has refused to provide Congress transparency about this program, yet this bill rewards him with a record-level payoff. This is unacceptable.”

Hagerty joins a chorus of Republicans critical of the deal which faces unexpectedly strong headwinds in an upper chamber which generally possesses a globalist, pro-migration tilt.

In the Senate, limited praise for the bill beyond lead architects Sens. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) and James Lankford (R-OK) has been tepid and non-committal.

Hagerty hammered the bill for providing resources to ease illegal immigration at the expense of enforcing border laws and undermining border integrity.

“In a nation of laws and borders, the acceptable amount of illegal immigration is zero,” he said. “Yet by providing billions for plane tickets and hotels to resettle illegal aliens throughout America, this bill is an illegal-immigration magnet.

Hagerty continued, “Under a President who started and could stop this crisis tomorrow, and whose solution to illegal immigration is to legalize it, any proposal that fails to fully secure the border is unacceptable. I’m a hard no.”

Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who touted his close work with McConnell on the deal, is expected to hold the first procedural vote on the bill Wednesday.

“I have never worked more closely with Leader McConnell on any piece of legislation as we did on this,” Schumer told reporters on Sunday.

Bradley Jaye is a Capitol Hill Correspondent for Breitbart News. Follow him on X/Twitter at @BradleyAJaye.

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