House Republican silences Jake Tapper with obvious fact after he accuses GOP of 'walking away' from border legislation

Rep. Mike Lawler (R-N.Y.) shut down CNN anchor Jake Tapper on Wednesday for accusing Republicans of "walking away" from a bill that supposedly will address the border crisis.

A bipartisan group of senators have spent weeks ironing out the details of legislation that a majority of Republicans say will not make any meaningful difference to alleviate the border crisis.

One of the more controversial proposals of the bill would still allow tens of thousands of migrants into the U.S. each month, placing any migrant who enters legally with legitimate asylum claims on a pathway to citizenship, according to NBC News.

The bill, moreover, would mandate a border "shutdown" if Border Patrol "encounters" an average of 5,000 migrants per day over a seven-day average. One of the obvious problems with the shutdown trigger is that it may incentivize migrants not to be encountered at all, thus becoming "gotaways." Meanwhile, President Joe Biden says he will "shut down" the border only if Congress passes the bill.

So Lawler did not take kindly to Tapper's accusation on Wednesday that House Republicans are "walking away from this compromise."

"First of all, Jake, nobody's actually seen the final details. And I think that it is necessary for everyone to actually see the details before making a definitive statement on it," Lawler told Tapper.

After Lawler explained why the border needs to be secured, Tapper asked Lawler if he sees the "disconnect" between a yet-to-be-written bill and House Republican opposition to it.

Lawler's response ultimately silenced Tapper.

"With all due respect, you haven't seen the bill. And interestingly, over the last few weeks, the media has been trying to pressure everyone to agree to a deal that hasn't actually been produced. Why don't we see what the final bill is? And then let's see if they pass it, and then we negotiate," Lawler told Tapper.

"President Biden and the Biden administration actually have authority right now to start to enforce our laws, and they're choosing not to. And that is a big part of the problem here," he added.

Democrats and the media are claiming that Republicans increasingly oppose the Senate bill because former President Donald Trump doesn't want Biden to receive credit for alleviating the border crisis. But the truth is that critics of the bill simply think it will do little — if anything — to solve the crisis.

Additionally, the bill doesn't provide any accountability for Biden's policies and the president's apparent refusal to use existing authorities to stymie the crisis.

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