And please stop looking at Border Security and Ukraine aid as an either/or. We can and should do both.

It's increasingly looking like we'll end up doing neither.

Apparently the GOP was unwilling to support a solo Ukraine aid measure, requiring that they get progress on one of their policy objectives in exchange for moving Ukraine aid through. They were going to get some of their preferred policies on border security....but now that Trump has opposed that idea, it's unlikely to happen. Without the "carrot" of Ukraine aid, it's hard to see how any border security measure gets out of Congress; and without the border security, it's hard to see how the Ukraine aid package passes, either.

I'm hoping that all Trump wants is the credit - that he wants to make sure that any border tightening is perceived by his voters as entirely and completely because of him, rather than McConnell and Biden and all the folks that are actually working to make it happen. So maybe if they just call it the "Trump Did This and it Never Would Have Happened Except for Trump Act of 2024," it might still get done. But I think it's far too likely that the measure just ends up dying on the vine, and neither policy advances.