all of their time focusing on budget questions, so i don t think that s a fair criticism. senate majority leader mitch mcconnell spoke just moments ago. let s listen. i ve just had an opportunity to speak with president trump, and he would, i would say to all my colleagues, has indicated that he s ready to sign the bill. he will also be issuing a national emergency declaration at the same time. and i ve indicated to him that i m going to prepare i m going to support the national emergency declaration. so for all of my colleagues, the president will sign the bill. we ll be voting on it shortly. and with that, i ask the chair to lay before the senate the conference report to accompany house joint resolution 31. okay, the news is changing in realtime here. you just heard from mitch mcconnell. he says the president is going to sign the bill, but he s going to declare a national emergency and mitch mcconnell says he
move, assuming everything holds based on what we heard from mitch mcconnell. we re also now getting a statement from the white house. let me read it to you real fast from sarah sanders. she says president trump will sign the government funding bill. and he will also take other executive action against a national emergency to ensure we stop the national security and humanitarian crisis at the border. the president is once again delivering on his promise to build the wall, protect the border and secure our great country. let s go to chris cilizza to explain why republican lawmakers aren t fans of this move. that s putting it mildly, ana. let s go through it. remember, donald trump has floetd a national emergency repeatedly, and he has backed away from it each time. apparently not now. let s put it in historical context. 1976 national emergencies act is passed to codify in ways in which the president of the united states can use emergency powers. that doesn t mean it was never
sanctions to foreign countries to ensure that they continue to behave. this one was bill clinton. he said nuclear proliferation was such a threat he had to address it with a national emergency. this is interesting. little bit of arcana but could be important. if trump declares a national emergency, and we think he s going to to trump declares national emergency. nancy pelosi, we just saw, the house could pass a privileged resolution, ana, which say we condemn this, we think it s a mistake. here he is, smiling mitch. it would make the senate have to vote because it s a privileged resolution. the senate would have to vote on it. it would essentially be a is a national emergency a good thing or bad thing? it would also be a stand in for is the border wall the right move or not?
one of them right now. yes, sir? on the news of the past couple of months, that the president told the senate majority leader he would sign the bill, you must be pleased with that. but on the national emergency, does that change the vote calculus at all? obviously, if you have the president saying he s going to sign a piece of legislation, he would say, okay, i would vote for that, but also that caveat, that could potentially be a few votes away. does that have any impact? let s just have the vote. that s very interesting, but let s just have the vote? does that change support one way or another? it is interesting to see how the vote, the president has said to the republican leadership in the senate, senator shelby, a senior opera senior, a respected leader in the united states snad senaenat
yeah. well, there s a reason why. there s an impact on people, ana. there s an impact on national security. let s say the president does do this, declare a national emergency, as we re hearing. you know, he could go to the department of defense and pull money from the department of defense. and that could, in turn, create a national security issue. he could go to fema and pull funding for emergency or disaster relief. that affects people. this is not just talking about one end of pennsylvania avenue to another, congress versus the white house. this is about national security. this is also about, you know, people possibly losing their jobs if projects from different organizations money is pulled from that. we re almost back at the same thing with the shutdown. it will impact people, national security as well as, you know, possibly not having services work the way they are. and people could lose their jobs with this as well. when we talk about precedent and if the president makes t