Lawmakers have reached a deal to reopen the government three days after Democrats forced a government shutdown over an illegal immigration issue. The Senate approved to advance a short-term funding bill to keep the government open through Feb. 8, on Monday. The vote was 81-18.
“I think if we’ve learned anything during this process,“ Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said after the vote, ”it’s that a strategy to shut down the government over the issue of illegal immigration is something the American people didn’t understand and would not have understood in the future.”
“So I’m glad we’ve gotten past that and we have a chance now to get back to work,” he said.
DACA was introduced through an executive order by President Barack Obama in 2012, as a temporary measure, that gave recipients renewable, two-year work authorization and deportation immunity. It involved nearly 800,000 individuals—referred to as Dreamers—who were illegally brought into the country as children.
Meanwhile, Trump demands a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border as part of any immigration deal.