Rand Paul announced on Sunday that he will vote against the Gang of Eight’s immigration bill because it does not sufficiently secure the Southern border.
“I’m like most conservatives in the country in that I think reform should be dependent on border security first,” Paul said, noting that he introduced a bill that was voted down that would have given Congress that power to vote on whether the border is in fact secure. “To me what really tells me that they’re serious would be letting Congress vote on whether the border is secure. If the people in the country want to be assured that we will not get another ten million people to come here illegally over the next decade, they have to believe that they get a vote through their Congress. If this is a done deal once the bill is over…I don’t think we’ll really get a truly secure border.”
The Senate this week will vote on both the Corker-Hoeven amendment, a last-minute attempt by Republicans to strengthen the border-security measures in the Gang of Eight’s bill, and the Gang’s bill itself.
Paul, an advocate of immigration reform, went on to say that the bill will undoubtedly pass the Senate, but that it’s “dead on arrival” in the Republican-controlled House.
