Cuellar: More than 54K CBP, BP agents working without pay in U.S. amidst government shutdown

Vehicles entering the U.S. from Nuevo Laredo wait in line at the Ready Lanes at Lincoln Juarez International Bridge on Saturday morning. As part of an outreach effort to encourage Ready Lane compliance, Saturday, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) handed out Ready Lane flyers and referred Ready Lane passengers that do not utilize radio-frequency identification technology (RFID)-enabled entry documents to an informational booth at their secondary inspection area. less Vehicles entering the U.S. from Nuevo Laredo wait in line at the Ready Lanes at Lincoln Juarez International Bridge on Saturday morning. As part of an outreach effort to encourage Ready Lane compliance, ... more Photo: Victor Strife Photo: Victor Strife Image 1 of / 23 Caption Close Cuellar: More than 54K CBP, BP agents working without pay in U.S. amidst government shutdown 1 / 23 Back to Gallery

A shutdown affecting parts of the federal government appeared no closer to resolution Wednesday, with President Donald Trump and congressional Democrats locked in a hardening standoff over border wall money that threatens to carry over into January.

Trump vowed to hold the line, telling reporters as he flew to Iraq that he'll do "whatever it takes" to get money for border security. He declined to say how much he would accept in a deal to end the shutdown, stressing the need for border security.

"You have to have a wall, you have to have protection," he said.

The shutdown started Saturday when funding lapsed for nine Cabinet-level departments and dozens of agencies. Roughly 420,000 workers were deemed essential and are working unpaid, while an additional 380,000 have been furloughed.

Significance for Laredo

Customs and Border Protection and Border Patrol spokespersons in Laredo did not return requests for comment regarding the shutdown on Wednesday.

And Laredo's Rep. Henry Cuellar was not sure of the exact number of furloughed employees here.

Most Border Patrol and CBP agents are considered essential employees, and are therefore working without pay until the shutdown ends. They will receive back-pay for their time worked, but Cuellar expressed an understanding that in the mean time, these agents have mortgages, car payments, medical bills and other expenses to consider.

More than 54,000 Border Patrol and CBP agents in the U.S. will be working without pay, Cuellar said. Non-essential, typically administrative positions in these agencies are not working. They make up about 2 percent of the Department of Homeland Security, according to Cuellar.

Congress has passed five appropriation bills, and there are seven remaining. Cuellar, who sits on the House Appropriations Committee, noted that the only holdout is the funding for Homeland Security, specifically the wall. All the other bills are ready to go, he said.

And Congress gave the president options to extend funding until February or until the end of September in order to avoid a shutdown, but he rejected them all, the congressman noted.

He took issue with the fact that this is the third government shutdown in the two years of the Trump administration. The others were over health care and DACA. The president will always find an issue to bring up, Cuellar said.

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"If we give in to the wall, what's he going to do next time?" he said. "... It's dangerous to allow a person to leverage that any time he wants to get something done."

Cuellar said he would support $5 billion in funding for Homeland Security, but not for a wall. Since the number of Border Patrol agents has dropped to about 19,200 from the historic high of 21,500, Cuellar said they need to fund retention bonuses for these employees to encourage them to stay.

Local Border Patrol union president Hector Garza told Laredo Morning Times that everyone expects to get a paycheck in the next pay period.

And when they weigh what is happening, the majority of agents think it's worth it, Garza said. Their morale is high with President Trump, Garza said, but they are unhappy with Congress.

Cuellar he said he will be meeting with Homeland Security officers today.

No deal

While the White House was talking to congressional Democrats — and staff talks continued on Capitol Hill — negotiations dragged Wednesday, dimming hopes for a swift breakthrough.

With no deal at hand, members of the House were told there would be no votes on Thursday, assuring the shutdown would last yet another day. Lawmakers are away from Washington for the holidays and have been told they will have 24 hours' notice before having to return. The Senate is slated to come into session Thursday afternoon.

Rep. Mark Meadows of North Carolina, a Trump ally who has been involved in the talks, said the president "is very firm in his resolve that we need to secure our border." He told CNN, "I don't know that there's a lot of progress that has been made today."

But he added of Democrats: "If they believe that this president is going to yield on this particular issue, they're misreading him."

The impasse over government funding began last week, when the Senate approved a bipartisan deal keeping government open into February. That bill provided $1.3 billion for border security projects but not money for the wall. At Trump's urging, the House approved that package and inserted the $5.7 billion he had requested.

On Friday afternoon, a Senate procedural vote showed that Republicans lacked the 60 votes they'd need to force the measure with the wall funding through their chamber. That jump-started negotiations between Congress and the White House, but the deadline came and went without a deal.

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer of New York on Saturday said funding for Trump's wall will "never pass the Senate."

"So President Trump, if you want to open the government, you must abandon the wall, plain and simple," Schumer said.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is in lockstep with Schumer against the wall funding. If the shutdown continues into 2019, she has vowed that her new Democratic majority will act quickly to pass legislation reopening the government.

The shutdown has been playing out against the backdrop of turmoil in the stock market, which is having a roller-coaster week.

Kevin Hassett, the chairman of the White House's Council of Economic Advisers, said the shutdown does not change the administration's expectation for strong growth heading into 2019. He told reporters a shutdown of a few weeks is not going to have any "significant effect on the outlook."

The shutdown that began on Saturday — the third of 2018 — caused a lapse in funding for nine of 15 Cabinet-level departments and dozens of agencies, including the departments of Homeland Security, Transportation, Interior, Agriculture, State and Justice.

Roughly 420,000 workers were deemed essential and were working unpaid, while another 380,000 were furloughed, meaning they'll stay home without pay. The shutdown complicates things for essential employees who planned trips for the holidays: According to the Office of Personnel Management rules, employees deemed essential or otherwise exempted from their respective agency furloughs can't take any vacation or sick days.

Furloughed federal workers have been given back pay in previous shutdowns.

Those being furloughed include 52,000 workers at the Internal Revenue Service and nearly everyone at NASA. About 8 in 10 employees of the National Park Service are staying home, and many parks have closed.

Roughly 44,000 U.S. Coast Guard employees are considered essential, and will report to work this week without pay, with another 6,000 furloughed. The Coast Guard is the only arm of the military affected by the shutdown because it is funded through the Department of Homeland Security.

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The shutdown didn't stop people from visiting the White Sands National Monument in southern New Mexico, where hundreds of unauthorized visitors have in recent days climbed over a fence to enter the monument, according to The Alamogordo Daily News. State highway workers were sent to the area Monday to erect "no parking" signs along U.S. 70 outside the monument.

Trump claimed on Monday that federal workers are behind him in the shutdown fight, saying many "have said to me and communicated, 'stay out until you get the funding for the wall."' He didn't say who he had heard from. Many rank-and-file workers have gone to social media with stories of the financial hardship they expect to face because of the shutdown.

One union representing federal workers slammed Trump's claim. Paul Shearon, the president of the International Federation of Professional and Technical Engineers, in a statement said the union has not heard from a single member who supports Trump's position.

"Most view this as an act of ineptitude," he said.

Associated Press reporters Darlene Superville and Juliet Linderman wrote this story. Laredo Morning Times reporter Julia Wallace contributed.

Update: An original version of this story included a comment from Border Patrol union president Hector Garza that said many Border Patrol agents in Laredo do not agree with Cuellar's stance on border security and the wall. Garza asked that we retract this statement because it is not true.