(Luis Cornelio, Headline USA) Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., one of the Senate negotiators on a border and immigration bill, faced scorching scrutiny following the release a purported summary of the potential bipartisan Senate deal.
First reported on the Friday edition of Fox News’ Ingraham Angle, the Immigration Accountability Project’s summary claimed that the deal would increase green cards by 50,000 per year and issue work permits to some illegal aliens. The deal would also provide taxpayer-funded attorneys to certain mentally incompetent aliens, along with the daily release of 5,000 illegal aliens.
This is the latest immigration scam they want to ram through—a grab bag of giveaways. No deal! pic.twitter.com/qrWuE7kePU
— Laura Ingraham (@IngrahamAngle) January 13, 2024
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., promptly rejected the early draft of such a deal on Saturday. He declared on Twitter, “Absolutely not” while also sharing a screenshot of the alleged summary of the bill.
Lankford refuted the allegations in a Twitter post, quoting Charles Haddon Spurgeon: “A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on.” The senator added, “I encourage people to read the border security bill before they judge the border security bill. I also advise people not to believe everything you read on the internet….”
A lie will go round the world while truth is pulling its boots on. -Charles Haddon Spurgeon 1855
I encourage people to read the border security bill before they judge the border security bill. I also advise people not to believe everything you read on the internet….
— Sen. James Lankford (@SenatorLankford) January 13, 2024
However, Lankford acknowledged expecting criticism during a Saturday interview with the Wall Street Journal. “I’m going to have a whole group of folks that say, ‘Not enough.’ I’m going to have a whole group of folks saying, ‘That’s crazy, that’s way too much,” he claimed.
Lankford mentioned being guided by compassion for the illegal aliens already in the U.S. According to the Journal, Lankford recalled a conversation with a pastor who told him that it was the “pastor’s job to love all immigrants equally.” He emphasized, “We have got to be able to do both those things.”
The Senate deal, negotiated with Sens. Kyrsten Sinema, I-Ariz., and Chris Murphy, D-Conn., is likely to be announced in the upcoming days, but no specific timeline has been established, Lankford told the Journal.
The immigration deal comes on the heels of an unprecedented influx of illegal aliens crossing the southern border. In December 2023, Border Patrol encountered a staggering 302,000 illegal aliens, the highest monthly figure in U.S. history.
