In the News

The House voted 257-167 in favor of fully funding the department charged with securing the nation’s homeland from terrorist threats even as a majority of Republicans stood in opposition.

The entire Arkansas delegation voted against the bill because it did not include language blocking the agency from implementing executive actions that President Barack Obama has ordered on immigration.

The immigration issue had stalled passage of the bill even as a partial shutdown of DHS loomed. Senate Democrats insisted on full funding and stood firmly against Republican efforts to block DHS from implementing executive actions to defer deportation of as many as 5 million undocumented immigrants.

Senate Democrats used procedural votes, requiring a 60-vote majority, to stall action. They also declined to form a bicameral “conference committee” to negotiate a final bill for an up-or-down vote. Instead, Congress last week approved a one-week extension of DHS funding to buy a little time for ending the legislative impasse.

The vote Tuesday will fund the agency through September without addressing the executive actions. The immigration orders, however, are on hold as a federal court considers a lawsuit filed against the immigration policies.

Rep. Steve Womack, R-Rogers, said he voted against agreeing to the Senate’s full year funding bill in protest.

“Our Founding Fathers gave Congress a tool to resolve legislative stalemates — the conference committee. It was one of their many strokes of genius. It’s extremely disappointing that Senate Democrats blatantly refused to use it in order to protect President Obama’s unconstitutional, unilateral actions on immigration,” he said.

Rep. Bruce Westerman, R-Hot Springs, said he supports funding DHS but could not support a bill that allowed the executive orders to be implemented.

“I will not lend my support to usurping the separation of powers outlined in the Constitution, be it for providing amnesty to illegal aliens or any other matter that the president tries to legislate from the Oval Office,” he said.

Rep. French Hill, R-Little Rock, said he also voted against the bill in protest.

“I voted ‘no’ today just to demonstrate my protest on the president’s illegal actions, and also my feelings about the Senate Democrats filibuster of the full DHS funding with the caveat that we just not fund the president’s executive order.”

House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer of Maryland said that in the end, two-thirds of the Senate and an overwhelming majority of the House had voted for the “common sense thing to do.” He noted that some 230,000 DHS employees would not have the assurance of being paid and having the resources to protect America.

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, said the bill passed because too many House Republicans viewed it strictly in the context of national security and ignored the “unconstitutional” actions of the president in usurping Article One powers from Congress.

“This Congress has not gone far enough to defend Article One of the Constitution because they saw it as a national security vote rather than a constitutional authority vote,” he said.

King, however, noted that there is a “growing snowball” of conservatives who disagree with House Speaker John Boehner’s tactics.

Initially, 52 House Republicans opposed efforts to pass a full-year funding bill without the caveats, but that number has grown to 167 today, he said.