President Donald Trump blasted Democratic lawmakers for rejecting a White-House-endorsed immigration proposal in a Friday tweet:
Cannot believe how BADLY DACA recipients have been treated by the Democrats…totally abandoned! Republicans are still working hard.
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 16, 2018
Trump’s tweet follows an incendiary White House statement Thursday night declaring, “Today, the Schumer Democrats in the Senate demonstrated again that they are not serious about DACA, they are not serious about immigration reform, and they are not serious about homeland security,” adding, “Schumer Democrats chose to filibuster it because they are held hostage by the radical left in their party, which opposes any immigration control at all.”
The White House endorsed a bill proposed by Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley during the Thursday votes, which closely tracked with the Trump administration’s proposed framework. The bill included $25 billion for border-wall funding, an end to chain migration, and an end to the diversity visa lottery program in return for a pathway to citizenship for 1.8 million illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children.
The bill received only 39 votes in the Senate. Many Republican and Democratic lawmakers have indicated they are most opposed to the Trump administration’s proposed cuts to legal immigration in the long term.