A top Republican senator who is tepid about the party’s Big Beautiful Bill said White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller cleared up a misunderstanding Thursday about how much money should be spent on completing the border wall.
Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin said he and other senators initially took issue with the Trump White House asking for $46 billion for constructing the southern border wall, when the first Trump administration only asked for $6.6 billion.
According to Mr. Johnson, the lawmakers did not have detailed information on the reasons for this gap, which the Wisconsin lawmaker described as a “misunderstanding.”
Mr. Miller explained to the GOP lawmakers that the new administration is now doing much more demanding construction and also has to clean up Biden administration neglect of the project.
In the first administration, “the 450 miles of new wall, was replacing old wall on land we already had,” Mr. Johnson said, describing Mr. Miller’s explanation. “Now we’re going into much more difficult construction.”
Mr. Johnson noted that he also discussed all the other funding that it required for “cleaning up this enormous mess” left by the previous administration.
According to Mr. Johnson it appears the GOP senators “did not have this information” and there was a “breakdown” in delivering it to the lawmakers earlier.
“So, again, we’re big supporters. It’s one of the things I said, ’You know, Stephen, you made the sale. We’re big supporters.”
“I’ve known Stephen since 2011, and so we’re friends. We’re big supporters of Stephen. We love when Stephen sits there and talks to [reporters] and tells you the truth,” Mr. Johnson said.
Mr. Johnson has yet to throw his full support behind the Big Beautiful Bill (BBB), and Republicans, who control the upper chamber, cannot lose more than three of their own members.
However, he told reporters he sees good progress being made and appreciates the outreach the White House is making to Congress, which also has involved President Trump, Vice President J.D. Vance and others.
“I’ve tried to lay out just the facts about the debt, and why we have a spending problem,” Mr. Johnson said.
Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who was not at the GOP meeting with Mr. Miller, is still a “no” on the BBB, but Mr. Trump plans to continue to lobby him at the upcoming annual White House picnic.
Mr. Paul told reporters Thursday that he would support the bill as long as a raising of the debt ceiling, which he does not support, is a separate vote.
• Kerry Picket can be reached at kpicket@washingtontimes.com.