Washington Free Beacon editor in chief Matthew Continetti said Tuesday that Democrats who are considering 2020 presidential campaigns are deepening the party's divisions on immigration.
Continetti pointed to Sens. Kamala Harris (D., Calif.) and Cory Booker (D., N.J.) as "2020 Democrats" who are threatening a government shutdown if Republicans don’t give into their demands on immigration policy. "Meet the Press Daily" host Chuck Todd said Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) would pass a bill without majority Republican support if President Donald Trump said he’d sign it.
"There is one element has been missing from this conversation so far and that is the 2020 Democrats," Continetti said. "You see with Kamala Harris, you see with Cory Booker—they are the ones who are drawing the hard line, and threatening a government shutdown."
Continetti said the politics of 2020 presidential hopefuls conflicted with the politics of Democratic Sens. Claire McCaskill (Mo.), Jon Tester (Mont.) and Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.), who are up for reelection in 2018.
"But I do think we're seeing the politics of 2018 where we have Democratic senators from Trump states, people like Claire McCaskill, Jon Tester, Heidi Heitkamp, whose interests do not align with the figures who are planning a run for the presidency," Continetti said. "So it's not just the Republican Party that’s divided on this issue, it's also the Democratic Party."
Harris, Booker, and other prominent Democrats have said they will not compromise on their immigration demands, namely protection for so-called Dreamers and refusal to fund a border wall.