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Congressional negotiators revealed Monday night that they had reached an "agreement in principle" on the funding of border security and other issues likely to avoid a second partial closure of the government this year.
When asked if they had reached an agreement with President Trump Senator Richard Shelby, R-Ala., Chairman of the Senate Credits Committee, told reporters: "We think so We hope. " Representative Nita Lowey, D-N.Y., Chair of the House Credits Committee, declined to give details of the agreement, but said a final text could be released Wednesday.
Legislators have until 11:59 pm. Friday, to get agreement between the two houses of Congress and signed by Trump before the closure of several Cabinet departments and the dismissal of hundreds of thousands of federal employees.
The focus will be mainly on the amount allocated. for the wall long promised by Trump along the US-Mexico border. The White House has asked for $ 5.7 billion for the barrier that Congressional Democrats have refused to fund. The Trump administration reacted by suspending the possibility that the president
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Democrats, however, accepted at least some of the money for Border structures reduce the funding of detention beds to limit what they view as an unnecessarily harsh enforcement on the part of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The issue of detention beds threatened to cloud the talks over the weekend, but both sides apparently overcame this issue. A Democratic assistant in the House told The Associated Press that Republicans had already agreed to fund cuts that would force ICE to reduce the number of detention beds to a range of 34,000 to 38,500 by the end of the year. l & # 39; year. Currently, ICE retains approximately 49,000 immigrants per day on average
But a proposal to limit to 16,500 the number of detainees captured in areas far from the border – a limit that Democrats believe is intended to prevent an overrun the agency's mandate – he's bumped into his Republican Wall.
Shelby told reporters Monday night that the bed problem was resolved, but he refused to give details. "We think it will work," he said. "We had difficult negotiations."
"ICE is asked to ignore the laws already passed by Congress," said ICE Deputy Director, Matt Albence, on the occasion of an appeal to media organized by the White House. "This will be extremely detrimental to the public security of this country.If we are obliged to respect the ceiling of internal arrests, we will be immediately obliged to release foreign criminals currently under our custody."
According to ICE figures, 66% of the estimated 159,000 immigrants reported to have been detained last year had already been convicted of crimes. In 2016, under President Obama, about 110,000 immigrants were arrested and 86% had a criminal record.
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At the White House on Monday afternoon, Trump softens his words.
"We can call it anything, we'll call it barriers, we'll call it whatever they want," said the president. "But now, it turns out that not only do they not want to give us money for a wall, they do not want to give us the space to hold murderers, criminals, drug traffickers, smugglers. "
Chad Pergram and the Fox News Associated Press contributed to this report.
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