Majority Leader Schumer Floor Remarks On Continued Negotiations On The National Security Supplemental

Washington, D.C. – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) today spoke on the Senate floor on the Senate continuing to work through negotiations on the supplemental package. Below are Senator Schumer’s remarks:

In addition to fully funding the federal government, senators have also been hard at work over the winter break on finalizing an emergency national security supplemental.

The supplemental package is a national necessity, with critical aid to help Ukraine defeat Putin, help Israel combat Hamas, provide needed assistance to innocent civilians in Gaza, and fix our broken immigration system.

At the end of last year, I said Democrats would remain committed to finding a bipartisan agreement on the supplemental. The only way to get something done on an issue as hard as the border is through bipartisan cooperation, and we have kept our promise to work in good faith.

Now, on the supplemental, it’s been a very promising few days. We have made more progress in the past couple of days on the border than we have in the past few weeks. The work is not yet finished, but I am more hopeful right now – even more than I was a few days ago – that we can get something meaningful done on the border and pass the supplemental.

Getting over the finish line is still not going to be easy. It will take continued compromise, good faith, recognition from both sides that nobody is going to get everything they want. Immigration reform has always been one of the hardest issues facing the Senate, but our broken border and our national security are at stake in this supplemental, and we must do everything we can to reach an agreement.

I urge my colleagues to continue their negotiations, and I want to thank them all for their good work to bring us to this point. Their example is an affirmation that the only way to get things done is through bipartisanship, so I urge them to stay the course until the work is done.

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