House Freedom Caucus Chairman Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) said he and Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) have patched things up following a heated argument that took place Wednesday on the House floor.
“We’ve had our conversation. We’ve made up,” Meadows said Thursday in an interview on Hill.TV’s “Rising.”
The spat between Ryan and Meadows came one day before the House is supposed to vote on a pair of immigration bills: a compromise measure that was negotiated by centrists and conservatives, and a more hard-line measure from Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.).
But Meadows, who could be heard yelling and arguing with Ryan on the floor, was furious that the final immigration package left out several provisions that had been agreed to during earlier negotiations.
Conservatives are also upset that leadership is bringing the original version of the Goodlatte bill to the floor instead of a modified version that was designed to win more support.
Meadows said the compromise bill left out language on the “Chevron deference,” which he wanted to ensure that agencies don’t have too much wiggle room when interpreting how to implement immigration laws.
He also took issue with how leadership wrote a provision in the bill creating a trigger mechanism that would halt new visas for Dreamers if Congress denies money for the border wall.
“The problem is, they kept saying, ‘it’s in there, it’s in there’. I read the entire bill and only with less than 24 hours before a vote did I find out that indeed it wasn’t in there,” Meadows said. “And I felt like it was going back on their word on what would actually be in the text. I don’t think I should be lead one way and then find out differently.”
— Melanie Zanona
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