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Sen. Rick Scott said Monday he would likely support his leadership’s plan to pair a party-line bill to fund immigration enforcement with a bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security. “I’ll vote for funding it if you put it all together, or know that you’re going to pass both,” he said at Semafor World Economy in Washington, DC.
Scott, a Florida Republican who is on the Senate Budget Committee, had criticized a largely identical version of the DHS funding legislation that the House previously rejected. The agency has been shut down for nearly two months amid congressional gridlock over funding it.
Scott also said Venezuela was “not where we need to be yet” after the Trump administration captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Acting president Delcy Rodríguez “ran the torture chambers” and was a “despicable person,” Scott said.
“I think the approach that Trump and Marco have taken has an opportunity for success. But we’re not there,” he added.
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Scott sidestepped a question about Trump’s attack on Pope Leo XIV, saying of Trump: “I didn’t see exactly what he said … he has a different social media presence than I do.” Trump over the weekend slammed the pope as “WEAK on Crime, and terrible for Foreign Policy” on his social media platform.
And Scott, who’d previously run for Senate Republicans’ top leadership position, didn’t rule out challenging Senate Majority Leader John Thune but seemed content with the South Dakotan’s leadership, saying “he’s trying his best.”
“I’m very appreciative that he’s trying to let people represent their states. The prior leader didn’t really do that,” he said.