Republicans want to talk about tax cuts. Instead, they’re talking about kids in cages.

Rather than touting lower taxes and a steady job market, House and Senate Republicans are being forced to answer for President Donald Trump’s contentious immigration policies — whether it’s separating migrant kids from their parents, removing DACA protections or building a border wall. And that’s likely bad news heading into November.


“The whole thing is a hot mess,” said Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.), who opposes splitting up families at the border but otherwise supports the administration’s stepped-up enforcement policies.

Even as the White House blames Congress for the crisis at the border, GOP lawmakers are struggling to craft a proposal that unites their own party, let alone one that can win bipartisan support and become law. And with no congressional solution in sight, Hill Republicans worry that Trump’s immigration crackdown could swamp their success on the economy and overshadow all the things they want to run on in the midterm elections.

“It’s something, as a dad, that bothers me. It’s something that bothers a lot of people,” said National Republican Congressional Committee Chairman Steve Stivers of Ohio. “I’m sure on its own, if you ask people, it probably doesn’t look good.”

“It’s a tragedy, what is going on. And it is not helpful to the president achieving his goals on immigration reform,” added Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine). “It’s not helpful in any way.”

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And the renewed focus on immigration is almost all self-inflicted, from Trump’s decision to end the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program to his relentless focus on the border wall to his “zero tolerance” policy for border-crossers, which has already led to more than 2,300 children being separated from their parents.

But the administration’s decision to separate children from parents has elevated the issue to one now consuming national politics. Hugh Hewitt, a leading conservative media voice, raised the prospect that the family separation crisis could become “the Republicans’ new Katrina and the president’s new Katrina” in an interview with Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) on Monday.

“Yes. I suppose it could. … Clearly, the country is focused on this. Clearly, it’s a horrendous situation if a small child is being taken away from the child’s actual mother,” Toomey responded. “We’ve got to solve this problem.”

Republicans from former first lady Laura Bush to Ohio Gov. John Kasich have called for the Trump administration to halt family separation at the border, and GOP senators are publicly calling on the administration to explain itself.

Even Senate Chaplain Barry Black appeared to bash the Trump policy on Monday.

“As children are being separated from their parents, remind us to love our neighbors as ourselves and to protect the most vulnerable in our world,” Black said as he opened the Senate with a prayer.

But Trump is defiant — blaming Democrats and saying it’s up to Congress to close legal “loopholes.”

“All the problems that we’re having, I say it very strongly — it’s the Democrats’ fault,” Trump said on Monday afternoon, adding that the United States “will not be a migrant camp, and it won’t be a refugee holding facility.”

“Congress alone can fix it,” DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told reporters.

Not everyone is buying it. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), said that while Congress can change the law, “the White House can fix it if they want to.”

Yet the president is receiving plenty of cover from Republican leaders, who blamed the minority party for refusing to embrace Trump’s immigration proposals.

“They think they’re winning on the narrative,” Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) said of the White House. “They think the politics are good for them.”

Cornyn is convening a small group of Republican senators to see if they can craft a “reasonable” legislative solution. He said there’s “urgency” to getting a solution.”

A new Quinnipiac University poll shows that 66 percent of Americans who participated in the survey oppose Trump’s move to separate migrant kids from their parents. But 55 percent of Republicans back the action.

Meanwhile, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle doubt that they’ll be able to pass narrow legislation dealing with the family separation issue without getting bogged down in the broader immigration debate that’s divided the country and both parties for years. And that leaves Republicans essentially in a holding pattern.

“This is insane. You’re getting mixed signals from different people in the administration, whether it be [Homeland Security] or the Justice Department. Nobody seems to know what the hell is going on,” said a House Republican lawmaker. “Democratic lawmakers are going down to these detention centers: It’s bad.”

For years, Republicans have blasted immigration policies directing border patrol agents to release undocumented families into the U.S. while awaiting court dates. The system, they say, was often abused, as many undocumented immigrants skipped their court dates and disappeared in the country.

But the alternative, they’re finding, is just as unsavory. Since migrant children may be held for only a few days, agents are separating the kids from their detained parents. Under a new House-proposed solution, kids would be kept with their parents — though kept in detention facilities longer.

House Republicans will vote Thursday on a pair of immigration bills that include the provision intended to keep families together, though immigrants-rights advocates are already blasting the Plan B as unhelpful. Some GOP leaders believe the pressure to find a solution to the crisis may end up winning them more support for a bill they’ve struggled to negotiate with conservative and moderate Republicans, though they acknowledge it could also have the reverse effect.

Rep. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.), a moderate from a South Florida swing district, said Monday that he is trying to add more provisions to the bill to “keep families together.”

“The goals of keeping children with their parents and enforcing our immigration laws are not mutually exclusive,” he said. Other moderate Republicans, however, have expressed skepticism about the proposed fix.

Regardless, both the leadership-crafted measure and a more conservative immigration bill face difficult roads to passage. GOP leaders are privately downplaying expectations, acknowledging that it will be up to Trump to help them get the plan over the finish line — especially after he initially panned it in an interview with Fox News on Friday.

The bill mirrors a Trump-backed framework, providing a path to citizenship for Dreamers and $25 billion for a border wall as well curbing legal immigration.

In the latest sign that the GOP is losing control of the narrative, House Republicans are expected to tout the six-month anniversary of their tax reform package this week. It’s doubtful that the news conference, headed by Ways and Means Committee Chairman Kevin Brady and Speaker Paul Ryan, will break through a news cycle focused on immigration.

Asked whether the immigration debate is stepping on the party’s message, Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) threw up his hands and said: “It depends on how it’s resolved.”

Meanwhile, vulnerable lawmakers whose districts have large Latino populations are seeking distance from the administration. Rep. Mario Diaz Balart (R-Fla.) called it “totally unacceptable” and said the administration should examine “any and every other option.” Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas) said “taking children away from their mommies isn’t going to stop terrorists or drugs from coming into our country.”

In the Senate, national Republicans announced a new ad touting Sen. Dean Heller’s (R-Nev.) work on veterans’ affairs. But that could all be drowned out by the border crisis in his diverse state. A spokeswoman said Heller “doesn’t support separating children from their families, and he believes that this issue highlights just how broken our immigration system is and why Congress must act to fix it.”

The issue could also affect Republicans’ message in other states with large Latino populations like Arizona and Florida. Gov. Rick Scott (R-Fla.), who is running for the Senate, said he does “not favor separating families.”

In contrast, all 49 Senate Democratic Caucus members have endorsed a bill that would end the family separation policy. But even moderate Republicans like Collins have rejected that bill as too “broad” and said it would make it too difficult to prosecute law-breaking adults.

“I’ve heard countless Republicans say that they oppose children being taken from their parents,” said Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), the measure’s lead sponsor. “If that’s true, they should support our bill.”

