http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/obama-tries-to-get-gop-to-blink-with-homeland-security-rhetoric/article/2559692Obama tries to get GOP to blink with Homeland Security rhetoric
By Brian Hughes | February 3, 2015 | 5:00 am
President Obama is encountering at least one major problem in his bid to shame Republicans into approving his budget request for the Department of Homeland Security: Most of the agency will continue to operate as normal, even if its funding runs out at the end of the month.
Border Patrol agents would still conduct inspections. Transportation Security Administration officials would screen airplane passengers. And they would have the tools of a sprawling federal agency at their disposal to confront the most dangerous threats, administration officials concede.
However, as Obama announced his proposed federal budget for next fiscal year on Monday, he focused much of his attention on the more immediate funding fight, how to keep DHS operating amid the simmering feud over his executive action to protect up to 5 million illegal immigrants from deportation.
Obama is banking that with less than a month remaining until DHS funding expires, Republicans will blink, not wanting to be blamed for imperiling the nation's defenses against security threats.
In many ways, the White House's approach to the DHS issue mirrors their strategy for handling the clash over the so-called sequester. As he did in 2013 when discussing the mandatory budget cuts, Obama often paints the repercussions of not getting his spending wishes as disastrous.
When the across-the-board budget cuts finally went into effect two years ago, most Americans responded with a collective shrug.
Even some of those aligned with the president on the DHS debate predict a similar result if Washington does not finalize a deal before Feb. 28.
“Republicans are correct that the world will not end,” a former Obama counterterrorism adviser told the Washington Examiner. “[DHS] won't fundamentally change and Americans should not panic. It's not like they are immediately less safe. But it still doesn't look to me like Republicans have a real endgame here. That's why Obama won't budge and why he'll continue to use language that is probably a bit over-the-top.”
The impasse over the Department of Homeland Security has been in the works for some time.
In December, Republicans agreed to fund the federal government through the end of the fiscal year, except for DHS. Conservatives argued they would have more leverage to confront Obama on his immigration action once they took over the Senate and had the ability to force him to veto legislation.
That theory will soon be put to the test, with Democrats expected to filibuster a House-passed bill this week that would fund the Department of Homeland Security but roll back the president's deferral of deportations.
Even if the bill reaches the president's desk, he has vowed to veto it.
In the meantime, Obama is using his bully pulpit to rally the public to his side.
“Until they pass a funding bill, it is the end of a paycheck for tens of thousands of frontline workers who will continue to get — to have to work without getting paid,” Obama said from DHS headquarters Monday. “Over 40,000 Border Patrol and Customs agents. Over 50,000 airport screeners. Over 13,000 immigration officers. Over 40,000 men and women in the Coast Guard. These Americans aren’t just working to keep us safe, they have to take care of their own families.”
The critical caveat to Obama's statement is that the overwhelming majority of such employees will continue to work. They also would likely receive back pay once lawmakers and the White House come to a resolution, as they did following the budget resolution ending the 16-day government shutdown.
Many conservatives believe the White House is trying to scare voters to score a political victory for the president.
“Most of this is hyperbole,” said Dan Holler, communications director for Heritage Action. “DHS will continue to function. Using the White House's logic, the other way to put it is the president is putting amnesty ahead of the safety of the country.”
That's why some Republicans, at least at the moment, aren't overly concerned about the current state of negotiations. They believe that Obama is not operating out of a position of strength and will absorb much of the blame if a DHS deal is not reached by the late-February deadline.
While Obama is proclaiming momentum after taking unilateral action on Cuba and immigration, Republicans counter that most Americans disapprove of how he is enacting his agenda. And they say that not confronting Obama would give him the ammunition to take constitutionally hazy action again.
Given the advantage that Republicans have long enjoyed on issues of national security — and their relentless insistence that Obama’s policies have eroded it — Democrats are relishing now putting conservatives on the defensive.
And even some of the most hardline opponents to Obama's executive action on immigration see a clear political incentive for his doom-and-gloom messaging.
“Most of DHS would not shut down — I would argue there's no impact on the security of the country,” said Mark Krikorian, executive director of the Center for Immigration Studies. “But if [the impasse] goes on for a long time, then it can start to be a real problem because workers don't get paid. Politically speaking, the White House rhetoric is going to resonate with some people who don't follow these events closely, just because it sounds so bad.”
Obama's message Monday reflected such a strategy.
“Don’t jeopardize our national security over this disagreement,” he told GOP lawmakers. "If Republicans let Homeland Security funding expire, it’s the end to any new initiatives in the event that a new threat emerges.”
