美国国家公共电台 NPR 'Agreement In Principle' Reached On Border Security Funding, Top Republican Says

 

STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:

What is in the border security agreement that congressional negotiators made last night? We are pretty sure of one thing that is not in it. Republicans and Democrats¹ left out most of the money that President Trump² was demanding for a border wall. The measure includes about the same amount of money for fencing that was available before the president's demand for a wall led to a partial government shutdown. The president learned of the deal just as he was arriving in El Paso, Texas, to promote spending on the wall that he once promised Mexico would pay for.

(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)

PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: Just so you know, we're building the wall anyway. They say that progress has been made with this...

(CHEERING)

TRUMP: Just now, just now. I said, wait a minute. I got to take care of my people from Texas. I got to go. I don't even want to hear about it.

INSKEEP: Bipartisan negotiators were reaching the deal on the day the president traveled. And NPR congressional reporter Kelsey Snell has been covering this story all along. Hi there, Kelsey.

KELSEY SNELL, BYLINE³: Hi there.

INSKEEP: OK. So what are the details you've been able to learn so far?

SNELL: So this is based on just some early reports from congressional aides who are familiar with the deal. We actually, as reporters and the public, have not seen this agreement yet because the people who write this bill, all of the staff were working on it all night long.

As far as we know, negotiators agreed to $1.375 billion for physical barriers at the border. Now, that's about the same level that was agreed to in last year's Department of Homeland Security funding bill. Now, what we're told is that the - that money's going to be used for about 55 miles of fencing. The details of where that will be has not been released. Trump has...

INSKEEP: But obviously a lot less than the couple hundred miles of wall that the president had been demanding to pay for.

SNELL: Right. That - President Trump had been demanding that $5.7 billion, so this is significantly less than that. And negotiators also agreed to more resources for non-barrier border security. And they agreed to a drop in the overall number of detention⁴ beds in Immigration and Custom (ph) Enforcement facilities. It's about a 17 percent drop from the current number of 49,000 to about 40,000.

INSKEEP: Would you help explain that last number? We've just been discussing this seriously over the last day or so on the program, but it's been an issue, I know, for a long time for congressional negotiators. Why does anybody care the exact number of beds that Immigration and Customs Enforcement has to - for detainees?

SNELL: All right. So part of the argument that Democrats are making is that if there are more beds, then it encourages Immigrations and Custom Enforcement, or ICE, to put more people in those beds. And they want to restrict the ability of ICE to do what they call internal enforcement, which is going around to cities and towns and bringing people in for detention. Republicans on the other hand say the beds are necessary for them to enforce existing criminal and immigration laws and if there is a cap put on the beds, that it artificially, you know, hamstrings the ICE officials from doing the job that they were employed to do.

INSKEEP: I guess we should try to sort out some fact checking here as well because the president last night in El Paso spoke⁵ of a mass release of violent offenders⁶. If there are still 40,520 detention beds, does it seem likely that ICE is going to have to do a mass release of violent offenders?

SNELL: We don't know any of the information about that yet. What we do know is that the agreement that was reached was based on requests from DHS and ICE themselves. And the negotiators, the people who wrote this spending bill, were in contact where - with ICE and DHS and briefed by them several times.

INSKEEP: That leads to one other point. The appropriators, the people in the appropriations⁷ committees who reached this deal, how would you describe their approach? Is it fairly bipartisan?

SNELL: It's very bipartisan. This deal was reached by a group of four leaders who write spending bills. And it was two Democrats and two Republicans. And they say they have pretty strong sign-off from leadership on both sides.

INSKEEP: OK. Kelsey, thanks for the update and the reporting. Really appreciate it.

SNELL: Thank you.

INSKEEP: That's NPR's Kelsey Snell.

1 democrats   

n.民主主义者，民主人士( democrat的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• The Democrats held a pep rally on Capitol Hill yesterday. 民主党昨天在国会山召开了竞选誓师大会。
• The democrats organize a filibuster in the senate. 民主党党员组织了阻挠议事。 来自《简明英汉词典》

2 trump   

n.王牌，法宝；v.打出王牌，吹喇叭

参考例句：

• He was never able to trump up the courage to have a showdown.他始终鼓不起勇气摊牌。
• The coach saved his star player for a trump card.教练保留他的明星选手，作为他的王牌。

3 byline   

n.署名；v.署名

参考例句：

• His byline was absent as well.他的署名也不见了。
• We wish to thank the author of this article which carries no byline.我们要感谢这篇文章的那位没有署名的作者。

4 detention   

n.滞留，停留；拘留，扣留；(教育)留下

参考例句：

• He was kept in detention by the police.他被警察扣留了。
• He was in detention in connection with the bribery affair.他因与贿赂事件有牵连而被拘留了。

5 spoke   

n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说

参考例句：

• They sourced the spoke nuts from our company.他们的轮辐螺帽是从我们公司获得的。
• The spokes of a wheel are the bars that connect the outer ring to the centre.辐条是轮子上连接外圈与中心的条棒。

6 offenders   

n.冒犯者( offender的名词复数 )；犯规者；罪犯；妨害…的人（或事物）

参考例句：

• Long prison sentences can be a very effective deterrent for offenders. 判处长期徒刑可对违法者起到强有力的威慑作用。
• Purposeful work is an important part of the regime for young offenders. 使从事有意义的劳动是管理少年犯的重要方法。

7 appropriations   

n.挪用（appropriation的复数形式）

参考例句：

• More commonly, funding controls are imposed in the annual appropriations process. 更普遍的作法是，拨款控制被规定在年度拨款手续中。 来自英汉非文学 - 行政法
• Should the president veto the appropriations bill, it goes back to Congress. 假如总统否决了这项拨款提案，就把它退还给国会。 来自英汉非文学 - 政府文件