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Building off of @ThePlumLineGS's great piece about the conference committee ahead, a few observations about the dynamics at play. /1
It's been said before, but Trump is now at the weakest point of his presidency. During the shutdown his popularity plummeted--most significantly among Independents--and by caving so transparently he sowed doubt in the minds of the one-third of die hards who stayed with him. /2 
Senate Republicans--who followed Trump into the shutdown in December, kept us in the shutdown by voting down the solution on Thursday, and then ate crow and unanimously supported those same deals on Friday to reopen government--hate him. /3
The Senate Rs appointed to the conference committee generally approach the DHS budget in a serious manner. They're not the anti-immigrant ideologues driving the country off a cliff and last Congress their bill gave Trump all of $1.6B of fencing--just what he requested then. /4
The House Rs appointed to the conference committee are a different story--their bill last Congress appropriated $5B for the wall--but now they are in the minority. Without a leader with the strategic sense of Pelosi, the House minority is the weakest place to be in Congress. /5
For the House Ds, Lowey and Roybal-Allard are the chairs of the full Appropriations Committee and the Homeland Security Subcommittee and Price is a former chairman and ranking member of the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee. /6
Pete Aguilar worked closely last Congress with Will Hurd (R-TX) on legislation that paired real, permanent protection for Dreamers with pretty sensible border security measures that involved investments in POEs and were meant to be informed by an actual strategy. /7
Cuellar is a border member who sometimes gives heartache to the Dem caucus. I will always remember him as the lone Democrat who cosponsored and then voted for legislation to gut trafficking and asylum protections for Central American children in 2014. huffingtonpost.com/2014/08/01/hou… /8
Importantly, not a single Democrat joined him in that vote then and there is no way the conference would join him in supporting a similar measure to put children in harm's way. /9
What does Cuellar bring to the conference? As a lifelong resident of the border, he is a staunch advocate for greater investments in our ports of entry and he is firmly opposed to allocating funds for Trump's wall. /10 cuellar.house.gov/news/documents…
What else will happen over the next 3 weeks to shape conference committee dynamics? Remember that Trump said yesterday if he doesn't get his wall he will either shutdown the government yet again or he will declare a national emergency to circumvent Congress. /11
First, we'll see congressional hearings exploring how devastating this last #TrumpShutdown was. Already @EnergyCommerce will hold a hearing on Thursday examining the impact on federal workers, public health, the environment and consumers. /12 energycommerce.house.gov/committee-acti…
We're also going to see new reports from government watchdog orgs and think tanks demonstrating the same.
The political costs for Trump and Republicans driving us back into another shutdown will be enormous (and clear enough even for them). washingtonpost.com/business/2019/… /13
The political costs for Trump and Republicans driving us back into another shutdown will be enormous (and clear enough even for them). washingtonpost.com/business/2019/… /13
Second, we'll see hearings on Trump's other escape hatch. On Tuesday, @HASCDemocrats have a hearing highlighting the wastefulness of the current troop deployment and the illegality of conscripting DOD personnel and $ for a fake emergency declaration. armedservices.house.gov/hearings?ID=93… /14
In the meantime, hopefully we'll learn more about DHS's fiscal mismanagement during the shutdown--how it overspent funds that it didn't INCREASE detention by thousands. More about the cruelty of family separation. More about the deaths of two kids in Border Patrol custody. /15
.@ThePlumLineGS is right: the conditions are right for Democrats to move the border security conversation in a constructive direction. It'll be a busy three weeks. /16
I’d add that one benefit of having seasoned Homeland Security appropriators as conferees is that they won’t be cowed into believing the lie that border security is weak. They know the history of skyrocketing appropriations. /17
