Iran Press/America: The three-week spending deal reached with congressional leaders, quickly passed by the Republican-led Senate and the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives without opposition and signed by Donald Trump, paves the way for tough talks with lawmakers about how to address security along the US-Mexican border.
The Republican president’s agreement to end the shuttering of about a quarter of the federal government without securing wall money - an astonishing retreat - came three days after he had insisted, “We will not Cave!”, Reuters reported.
But Trump vowed that the shutdown would resume on Feb. 15 if he is dissatisfied with the results of a bipartisan House-Senate conference committee’s border security negotiations, or he would declare a national emergency in order to get the wall money without congressional approval.
The president's decision Friday to agree to end the shutdown without securing money for a wall along the US-Mexico border spawned immediate criticism from conservatives, who warned that he had weakened his negotiating position with Democrats going forward, Hill reported.
Trump tried to defend himself from that criticism Friday night on Twitter, saying the deal was "in no way a concession."
While House Democrats have been passing funding packages for weeks, the Senate vote on the short-term bill came only a day after the chamber rejected two proposals that would have reopened the government. But the calculus changed on Friday as federal workers impacted by the shutdown missed their second paycheck and news of delays at major airports across the country dominated the headlines.
The 21-day stopgap bill will set up another deadline in mid-February for Trump and lawmakers to resolve the fight over construction of a border wall. Trump's demand for wall funding has been at the center of the budgetary stalemate that began Dec. 22.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch Mc Connell (R-Ky.) quickly endorsed the short-term plan on Friday, saying it would provide "room to negotiate a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security." McConnell had voted against a two-week CR the previous day.
The Senate passed a stopgap bill late last month that would have funded the government through Feb. 8, but Trump caught lawmakers flat-footed when he said he would not support it because it did not include wall funding.
Underscoring their wariness, GOP senators largely declined to comment on the deal ahead of Trump’s announcement Friday, saying they wanted to wait to hear what he said. The Senate also recessed so senators could watch his speech. 101/202
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