Obama urges fast approval for border funding

WASHINGTON – Tens of thousands of children streaming from chaotic Central American nations to the U.S. border have overwhelmed the government’s ability to respond, senior administration officials said Wednesday as President Barack Obama urged Congress to move swiftly to approve an emergency spending request for the crisis.

Emerging from a highly anticipated meeting with Texas Gov. Rick Perry in Dallas, Obama said he was open to suggestions from Perry and others that he dispatch National Guard troops to the border, but warned such a solution would only work temporarily. He said Republicans appealing for him to embrace their ideas for addressing the crisis should grant his request so the government will have the resources to put those ideas into action.

“The problem here is not major disagreement,” Obama said, but rather getting Congress to release the needed funds. “If they’re interested in solving the problem, then this can be solved. If the preference is for politics, then it won’t be solved.”

But as Obama traveled to Texas, Republican opposition hardened to his $3.7 billion request, leaving any solution unclear. At the same time, the political pressures on the president appeared to grow from all sides, as Republicans denounced him on the Senate floor and even some Democrats began to join GOP demands for him to visit the U.S.-Mexican border – calls the White House continued to reject.

In Washington, Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., who has supported Obama’s stalled quest to remake the nation’s immigration laws, said he could not support the president’s spending request.

“I cannot vote for a provision which will then just perpetuate an unacceptable humanitarian crisis that’s taking place on our southern border,” McCain said on the Senate floor, where he was joined by fellow Arizonan Jeff Flake and Texas Republicans John Cornyn and Ted Cruz. They took turns blaming Obama’s policies for causing the border situation, contending that his efforts to relax some deportations have contributed to rumors circulating in Central America that once here, migrant kids will be allowed to stay.

In the House, Speaker John Boehner was noncommittal about bringing the spending measure to a vote.

“If we don’t secure the border, nothing’s going to change. And if you look at the president’s request, it’s all more about continuing to deal with the problem,” Boehner told reporters.

Meanwhile immigration advocacy groups attacked the spending request from the left, saying it was overly focused on enforcement. A group of civil liberties organizations filed a lawsuit in Seattle against the Obama administration, arguing that the federal government is failing to provide the minors with legal representation.

And even some Democrats said Obama would be well-advised to visit the border and see the situation for himself.

“Going out there and talking to people who live this day in and day out – that’s the perspective that’s missing,” said Rep. Raul Grijalva, D-Ariz.

The White House didn’t budge, and Obama flew to Dallas.

Asked about Obama’s decision not to go to the border, White House spokesman Josh Earnest noted that other administration officials have done so and have a detailed understanding of the situation.

“So the president is well aware of exactly what’s happening,” Earnest told reporters.

Perry, who has pressed Obama to go, has visited the Rio Grande Valley twice since the surge in unaccompanied child immigrants gained national attention. On June 23, he visited a Border Patrol facility and spoke of an “untenable situation.”

The head of U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Gil Kerlikowske, told senators in Washington on Wednesday that the number of unaccompanied minors picked up since October now stands at 57,000, up from 52,000 in mid-June and more than double what it was at the same time last year. They’re coming mostly from El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala, often fleeing gang violence.

The Obama administration says it wants more flexibility to turn the children around more quickly, since current law requires minors from countries other than Mexico or Canada to go through the court system in what is often a lengthy process. But immigrant advocates and some Democrats are balking at that idea, arguing that it would jeopardize the children’s legal protections and put them at risk.