US Senate votes to end Donald Trump’s border ‘national emergency’, as 12 Republicans team up with Democrats

The Republican-run US Senate rejected President Donald Trump’s declaration of a national emergency at the southern border on Thursday, setting up a veto fight and dealing him a conspicuous rebuke as he tested how boldly he could ignore Congress in pursuit of his highest-profile goal.

The Senate voted 59-41 to cancel Trump’s February proclamation of a border emergency, which he invoked to spend US$3.6 billion more for border barriers than Congress had approved.

Twelve Republicans joined Democrats in defying Trump in a showdown many Republican senators had hoped to avoid. The president commands diehard loyalty from millions of conservative voters who could punish defecting lawmakers in next year’s elections.

With the Democratic-controlled House’s approval of the same resolution last month, Senate passage sends it to Trump. He has shown no reluctance to casting his first veto to advance his campaign exhortation to “Build the Wall,” and it seems certain Congress will lack the two-thirds majorities that would be needed to override him.

“I’ll do a veto. It’s not going to be overturned,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office. “It’s a border security vote.”

Though Trump seems sure to prevail in a veto battle, it remains noteworthy that lawmakers of both major political parties resisted him in a fight directly tied to his cherished campaign theme of erecting a border wall.