Trump betrays House Republicans on immigration The president told GOP lawmakers to quit trying to pass their bill — a reversal that may doom leadership’s efforts.

Two days ago, President Donald Trump promised House Republicans he'd have their backs "1,000 percent" on immigration. On Friday, he told them to “stop wasting their time” — putting GOP leaders in an impossible position and throwing the conference into chaos.

But House Republican leaders say they plan to forge ahead with an immigration vote next week nonetheless.


Speaker Paul Ryan's team has spent weeks trying to strike an accord between moderate Republicans from swing districts and conservatives who are petrified of being accused of supporting "amnesty."

And House Republicans exited a Thursday night meeting saying they believed they had a "breakthrough" between the two wings of the party on a compromise that would help Dreamers and boost border security.

But Trump undercut his party’s plans Friday, telling them to wait until after the midterm elections to act.

“Republicans should stop wasting their time on Immigration until after we elect more Senators and Congressmen/women in November,” the president wrote on Twitter. “Dems are just playing games, have no intention of doing anything to solves this decades old problem. We can pass great legislation after the Red Wave!”

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House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) said on the House floor that they would vote next week anyway, a rare act of defiance for the close Trump ally.

"We have been working very closely with the entire conference, taking all ideas in," McCarthy said. "We had a very productive conference last night, and we'll work through the weekend and you will see that bill on the floor next week."

Still, the tweet puts Ryan in a serious bind.

To stave off a discharge petition from moderate Republicans and Democrats, the Wisconsin Republican promised the centrists that he'd give them a vote on some sort of bill they could support. If Ryan listens to Trump and cancels the vote, moderates will be furious.

“Votes were pledged in order to turn off the discharge petition,” Chief Deputy Whip Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.) told reporters Friday. “The intention is to fulfill it.“

But if Ryan holds the vote, the result could be catastrophic. GOP members who thought they could support the bill have already started telling leadership that they will no longer vote for it. They simply cannot go up against the president, they say.

That means the bill likely would fail in spectacular fashion on the House floor, which would be a huge embarrassment to leadership and an affront to the rank in file who have spent hundreds of hours in negotiations.

The vote could also endanger the lame-duck speaker. Rep. Steve King, a vocal hard-liner, suggested Friday that some conservatives could try to oust Ryan with a motion to vacate the chair, though King was coy about why he thought so.

“We’ll have to see how that cooks over the weekend,” the Iowa Republican said. “I’m reading the tea leaves, but I believe [a motion to vacate] is prepared.”

That could fuel a backlash, however. Members across the spectrum have praised Ryan for his work trying to find a GOP solution on immigration, working with all corners of the conference. Conservatives who then punish him could face their own political attacks from Ryan loyalists.

Trump's tweet suggests that the president has retracted his original view of the bill. While the compromise legislation mirrors his own immigration framework — cracking down at the border and finding a pathway to citizenship for young undocumented immigrants — the president didn't like the word "moderate" being used to describe the package.

Last Friday, he told "Fox & Friends" that he would not sign it, only to be walked back by GOP leaders and White House officials who had been working on the measure. On Tuesday, he came to the Hill to try to tell members it's OK to vote for both the compromise bill and a more conservative immigration bill, which was voted down on Thursday.

“I am with you all the way," he told them Tuesday night.

While some members viewed that as an endorsement, conservatives and other skeptics called it "wishy-washy." One member told POLITICO that Trump's speech that night was the "worst speech" he had ever given and did not move the needle.

Rep. Raúl Labrador told reporters Thursday that he wouldn't be surprised if Trump actually lost votes in the meeting because of his dig at Sanford, who lost his primary last week.

GOP leaders spent virtually all of Wednesday trying to convince lawmakers that Trump supported the bill. They took some to the White House to speak with him personally, and Trump ended up flipped a few members from "undecided" to "yes."

Republicans had planned to vote on the “compromise” bill Thursday, but delayed it after rank-and-file lawmakers asked for more time to review the proposal.

During a Thursday night GOP Conference meeting, House Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) stood up and told members that Trump told him to deliver a message: pass the compromise bill.

That would have been the most specific endorsement yet from the president, albeit one that wasn't from his own lips.

But lawmakers can see through those messages, they say. Many have told POLITICO that Trump simply doesn't want to endorse the legislation lest he get pummeled on the far right. Hard-line immigration groups have been calling the bill "amnesty," and Trump clearly doesn't want to take them on.

GOP leaders may be starting to get the picture, too: No matter what they do, they can't seem to pin him down.

Some lawmakers predicted Friday that the immigration vote would be called off.

"Game over," Rep. Mark Sanford (R-S.C.) told CNN when asked if the president's Friday morning tweet marked the end of GOP efforts to pass immigration legislation in the House.

"It takes the wind out of the sails in what might have been a fairly productive weekend in terms of looking for a compromise. I don't know how it happens," he said. "If you look at how contentious this issue is, how much emotion there is, you know, without the president being out front, without the president having legislators' backs, there's no way they're going to take the risks that would be inherent in a major reform bill."

But others defied that prediction and called for the roll call.

“We need to get something done, whatever it takes to get something done,” said Rep. Mike Simpson (R-Idaho). “What are we going to get 60 Republican senators? I don’t think that’s going to happen.”

And House Majority Whip Steve Scalise said Trump's tweet was not actually an instruction to postpone the immigration vote.

"He didn’t say to pull it," Scalise said, despite Trump's call to delay the debate until after the midterm elections. "He’s just acknowledging there is no willingness of Democrats to work with us to solve this problem."

"There’s going to be a bill next week," he said. "If you’re interested in solving this problem, there is a bill for you to vote yes on.”

Kyle Cheney contributed to this report.