Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) rejected the idea that the United States can hold off on making changes to border policy after former President Donald Trump killed a border bill earlier this year.
Instead, the South Carolinian senator expressed support for a $66 billion House proposal with aid to Israel and Ukraine, along with border security provisions that would include reimplementing the “remain in Mexico” policy.
Graham, a fierce supporter of Trump, said that he wants to pursue action on the border through legislation because it is a “national security nightmare” that “cannot wait,” while on CBS News’s Face the Nation on Sunday.
“President Trump says, let’s wait on the border. With all due respect, we cannot wait. It’s a national security nightmare, a 2000% increase in people on the terrorist watch list coming across the border in two years,” Graham said.
Graham added that he also wants to turn the aid package “into a loan,” while noting the danger the high levels of fentanyl crossing the southern border pose to Americans.
“Five billion people could be killed by the amount of fentanyl coming across our southern border. The largest loss of life of young people in America is fentanyl poisoning coming across the southern border. So I don’t want to wait. I want to act now on the border. I want to turn the aid package into a loan. That makes perfect sense to me,” he added.
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“I’m saying that the House proposal — it depends on how it’s written — makes perfect sense to me,” he said. “I think you’ll pick up six to eight Republicans who want to help Ukraine but believed that the bipartisan border bill was not sufficient enough.”
An earlier foreign aid bill with provisions for border security, which was negotiated by Democratic and Republican senators for four months, fell apart after it was unveiled, leading the upper chamber of Congress to vote for the package without border security last week.
