House to vote next week on border security legislation

WASHINGTON (AP) - The House is moving toward a vote on a bill aimed at securing the U.S. border with Mexico as majority Republicans try to show they can chart their own course on immigration, not just oppose President Barack Obama's.

The legislation passed the House Homeland Security Committee late Wednesday on a party-line vote of 18-12, and the full House is expected to take it up next week.

"For God's sakes, if we can't unite around border security what can we unite around?" said GOP Rep. Michael McCaul of Texas, the committee's chairman.

It's uncertain whether House Republicans will unite behind the measure. Conservatives who have scuttled past attempts by GOP leaders to deal with the issue expressed concerns that the legislation does too little to stem illegal immigration.

Several also groused that leadership was trying to rally support for the border security bill instead of making a strong stand against recent executive actions by Obama granting relief from deportation to millions.

The border bill "is a show horse, not a work horse, and as such it is an effort to convince the American people that we are doing something substantive to secure the border when in fact nothing substantive is being done," said Rep. Mo Brooks, R-Ala.

The Obama administration said the bill "would actually leave the border less secure."

In a statement released Thursday night, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson said, "The bill sets mandatory and highly prescriptive standards that the Border Patrol itself regards as impossible to achieve, undermines the Department of Homeland Security's capacity to adapt to emerging threats, and politicizes tactical decisions." He called the bill "unworkable, plain and simple."