NASHVILLE - U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., on Wednesday offered three suggestions to President Donald Trump and congressional Democrats on how they might resolve the ongoing partial government shutdown over border wall funding.
The list included going "really big" on the underlying dispute by "creating a legal immigration system that secures our borders and defines legal status for those already here."
"Government shutdowns should be as off-limits to budget negotiations as chemical weapons are to warfare," Alexander wrote in an op/ed, published Wednesday in The Washington Post. "Nevertheless, we are stuck in one. Resolving it by going Real Big on immigration could be Trump's Nixon-to-China, Reagan-to-the-Berlin-Wall moment in history."
It came as the partial government shutdown over Trump's border wall funding demands entered its 12th day with nearly 800,000 federal workers impacted in areas ranging from the Department of Homeland Security as well as the Departments of Agriculture and Interior.
But by late Wednesday afternoon, no one had picked up on Alexander's advice. The shutdown, affecting about a quarter of the federal government's operations, continued. Earlier, Trump met with Senate and House Republican and Democratic leaders to discuss the impasse as Democrats prepare to assume power in the House on Thursday.
Democrats said they were willing to provide about $1.3 billion for border security while Trump is demanding about $5.6 billion.
In his op/ed Alexander, chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, recalled a mid-2015 meeting he had with President Barack Obama and Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., over changes to the "No Child Left Behind" education law.
"Our conversation that day in the Oval Office offers a lesson for resolving the current partial government shutdown," Alexander wrote, adding the then-president told him there were "three things that had to be in the legislation."
Obama had wanted annual testing, an early-childhood education program and a focus on turning around the nation's lowest 5 percent of schools in terms of student performance.
Alexander said he told Obama all "three things would be in the final bill." It passed and on Dec. 10, 2015, Obama signed the overhaul into law, calling it a "Christmas miracle," Alexander recalled "even though there were plenty of other provisions in it he didn't like."
"You kept your word," Alexander recalled Obama telling him. He said he told Obama "So did you."
"Why, as a Republican, did I agree to a Democratic president's requests with which I did not concur?" Alexander asked. "Because I have read the Constitution and understand that if the president does not sign legislation, it does not become law."
Moreover, the senator wrote, he knew the education law would represent the "largest devolution of federal control to the states in a quarter-century" - repealing the Common Core mandate, dismantling a national school board and restoring local control of schools."
Alexander said they were able to forge a consensus with wide support while "nobody ever suggested shutting down the government to get his or her way. We knew we were elected to get a result if we could."
"What is the lesson in that story for today?" Alexander said. "First, Democrats should recognize now, as I did with Obama in 2015, that if an elected president has a legitimate objective, they should bend over backward to accommodate it - if they want a result."
As for Trump, Alexander said, "he should be specific and reliable, as Obama was in 2015 when he told us he needed three things, and, after Congress passed legislation that included the president's requests, he signed the bill into law."
Alexander also said in the op/ed that since Trump "made it clear he won't sign any legislation to reopen the federal government without some increase to funding for border security," there are three options "for where we could go from here."
The first is "go small," according to Alexander. "Give the president the $1.6 billion he asked for in this year's budget request, which the bipartisan Senate Appropriations Committee approved. Provide an additional $1 billion to improve border security at ports of entry, which everyone concedes is needed."
Option 2 is to "Go Bigger," Alexander wrote. "Pass the bill that 54 senators voted for last February, which combined a solution for children brought to the United States illegally (Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA) and $25 billion in appropriated funding for border security over 10 years. The bill failed only because of last-minute White House opposition."
The third option is to "Go really big: Begin the new Congress by creating a legal immigration system that secures our borders and defines legal status for those already here."
Alexander noted that in 2013, 68 senators - including all 54 Democrats - voted for that but the GOP-controlled House "refused to take it up. That bill included more than $40 billion and many other provisions to secure our borders."
Alexander, the state's senior senator, announced last month he would not seek election to a fourth term.
Contact Andy Sher at asher@timesfreepress.com or 615-255-0550. Follow him on Twitter @AndySher1.