Southwest Florida GOP Congressman Byron Donalds in the Capitol in Tallahassee on Jan. 9, 2024 (photo credit: Mitch Perry)
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Southwest area GOP Congressman Byron Donalds says that there may be a partial or full government shutdown within the next few weeks — and he says he’s okay with that, because he’s not happy about the budget agreement GOP House Speaker Mike Johnson made with Senate Democrats this weekend.
There is a Jan. 19 deadline for four spending bills and a Feb. 2 deadline for the other eight appropriations measures.
Johnson and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Sunday that they had agreed to a $1.66 trillion funding deal that would reduce overall spending by the federal government. But the announcement provoked anger among some conservative House Republicans because it is similar to the proposal that former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy made with Biden last year that in part led to McCarthy’s ouster.
“I don’t agree with the deal being talked about,” Donalds told the Phoenix, minutes after listening to Gov. Ron DeSantis give his State of the State address at the Capitol on Tuesday. “I think it’s a bad deal for the country. Chuck Schumer seems to love it, which means I hate it.”
Donalds was in the House of Representatives on Tuesday in Tallahassee — he had been a state House member several years ago in the Florida Legislature — and watched the governor’s State of the State address. Several other former state lawmakers attended the address on Tuesday.
While in the Florida Capitol building, Donalds said that the federal government is still spending more money than they did before the COVID-19 epidemic hit nearly four years ago.
Federal spending jumped from $4.45 trillion in 2019 to $6.21 trillion in 2023, according to the Congressional Budget Office, a 40-percent increase.
“My position has been let’s get back to pre-COVID spending levels,” Donalds said. “It doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. At a minimum we should cut spending. This deal doesn’t even cut spending. In a time when we’re running a two-trillion deficit. At a time when inflation is still a problem in our country. So this is a bad deal. We should not go along with this deal, and if the Senate and the White House wanted to spend us into oblivion? Then the answer is no, there will not be a deal. And they can come back to the table whenever they’re ready and whenever they’re serious.”
Donalds is also a hardliner when it comes to including border security changes in the negotiations between the White House, Senate Democrats and the GOP-controlled House when it comes to a supplemental funding bill to also provide funding for Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan.
There have been more than 483,000 encounters at the southwest land border just since last October, and more 4 million undocumented people have entered the U.S. through the southern border since Biden took office in 2021, according to U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Those numbers are fueling the reason why congressional Republicans insist that immigration policy changes need to take place right now, a point emphasized last week by House Speaker Mike Johnson, who led a delegation of House Republicans to the border last week.
“If President Biden wants a supplemental spending bill focused on national security, it better begin by defending America’s national security,” Johnson said. “It begins right here on our Southern border.”
“This is not hard,” Donalds says about some of the proposed policy changes being discussed.
“All we’re saying is that we can’t have 300,000 people coming across the southern border illegally. That’s common sense. All we’re saying is let’s go back to the border crossing levels under Jeh Johnson in Barack Obama’s administration like, I don’t see why that is outside the pale. So my position and the position of a lot of Republicans is very clear: if the fed government can’t secure its border, the fed government does not deserve any money. Period. Full stop. We’ve gotta secure our border first and foremost. It is a primary function of the federal government. If they won’t do that job, why do they need roughly $6 trillion in new money. Why?”
But the divisions between Republicans and Democrats on immigration remain stark, including in Florida’s own congressional delegation.
Rep. Darren Soto, via his Facebook page
Central Florida Democratic Congressman Darren Soto says that the GOP needs to compromise with Democrats in connection with immigration negotiations.
“First of all, we don’t think a supplemental [bill] should include policy. It should include funding,” Soto told the Florida Phoenix in an interview last Friday afternoon. “Whether it’s funding for disaster relief or Ukraine and Israel or of course for the border. We’re supportive of those things, but adding in immigration policy is something we’re against, including the dreaded HR 2.”
H.R 2 is a bill that the GOP-controlled House passed last May that includes resuming hundreds of miles of construction of a border wall, removing funding from nonprofit groups that aid migrants, beefing up staffing of Border Patrol agents and restricting the use of parole programs.
The Biden administration’s supplemental bill does include $14 billion for border security, but the president has said he would veto H.R. 2 if it made it to his desk.
The House Homeland Security Committee also will hold a hearing Wednesday to begin an impeachment case against Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas over his handling of the situation.
When asked if he believes that there is a crisis on the border, Soto admits that “we have a major challenge,” which is why he says it’s now “incumbent upon the House Republicans to support President Biden’s budget request for the supplemental. They dragged it out over the holiday break and we’re seeing now more than ever that we need that funding.”
Soto says preserving so-called immigration parole is a necessity for migrants who have come to Florida.
“I can’t tell you how many folks are coming from Venezuela, Cuba and Haiti to Florida under the parole program,” Soto says. “Our office works with these communities every day. Some of the Nicaraguans who also qualify under the program [are here], so that’s an important program for Florida. It’s one of the reasons that’s helping small businesses around here. It’s reuniting families. We have big diasporas of Venezuelans and Haitians in Central Florida in particular, so making sure that we preserve the parole program that’s there is an important part.”
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