A GOP reconciliation bill for immigration enforcement survived its first key test Thursday as the Senate kicked off its amendment “vote-a-rama” amid bipartisan anger over a Justice Department “anti-weaponization” fund.

On a 49-50 vote, the Senate rejected a procedural motion by Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., to send the bill back to the Judiciary Committee, a move that would have effectively killed it. Schumer was seeking to use that maneuver to push for a prohibition against what critics called a nearly $1.8 billion “slush fund” for Trump loyalists who broke the law.

While some Republicans want to prohibit or restrict the fund through legislation, they proved unwilling to derail the entire bill. Still, three Republicans facing reelection this year —Susan Collins of Maine, Jon Husted of Ohio and Dan Sullivan of Alaska — supported Schumer’s motion.

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La., who lost his reelection bid in the primaries in large part thanks to President Donald Trump’s opposition, is another vocal critic of the “anti-weaponization” fund and wants to see a prohibition written into law. He held back his vote on the Schumer motion for much of the extended period the tally was held open, before eventually voting against it.

“I want this to be a Republican-led solution,” said retiring Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., a leading GOP critic of the fund, before opposing Schumer’s motion. “I’m not going to move on a Democrat motion.”

But Tillis then offered his own amendment to block the fund by diverting the money to fraud enforcement efforts.

That effort, too, was rejected by a lopsided margin of 15-84. Democrats said the Tillis amendment wouldn’t actually prohibit the fund and would likely create a slush fund by another name, under the guise of fraud enforcement.

GOP leaders maneuvered to make adoption of such amendments more difficult when they stripped $1.46 billion in Justice Department funding from the bill. That move meant an amendment on the Justice Department fund would no longer be considered germane to the bill and would require 60 votes to overcome a procedural objection, instead of just a simple majority.

More amendments on the way

That defeat was hardly the end of the fight over the anti-weaponization fund, however.

The vote on Schumer’s motion had to be held open for about three hours on the floor as Republicans used their leverage to negotiate for amendments they were seeking.

Besides Tillis, other wary Republicans have filed a range of amendments. Cassidy filed a similar amendment that would prohibit payments from the Justice Department fund.

A second Cassidy amendment would nullify a settlement agreement announced when President Donald Trump withdrew his $10 billion lawsuit against the IRS over his leaked tax returns. That agreement forbids tax audits of the president. And a third amendment would prohibit such settlements in the future.

Other GOP amendments filed include:

• An additional Cassidy amendment that would establish a $100 million “January 6 Law Enforcement Heroes Compensation Fund.”
• A fifth amendment from Cassidy that would walk back the Trump administration’s newly announced green card policy requiring many applicants to return to their home countries as they await a decision.
• A sixth amendment from Cassidy that would raise the retirement age for Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers with less than 25 years of service to offset the costs of the reconciliation bill.
• An amendment sought by Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska that would permanently exempt seasonal fish processors from the numerical cap on H-2B non-immigrant visas.
• Another Murkowski amendment that seeks to provide “a fee exemption for applications for naturalization filed by certain nationals who have resided in outlying possession of the United States.”
• A second amendment by Tillis that would set up a new nonimmigrant visa for “mobile entertainment workers” like circus performers.
• A third Murkowski amendment that seeks exemptions for public school employees from nonprocessing-related fees for H-1B visas.
• Democrats, meanwhile, planned to put Republicans on the record on a number of other controversial topics through their proposed amendments, though those amendments were likely to be unsuccessful.

“Democrats will force Republicans to vote on Trump’s MAGA slush fund, his lifetime tax exemption, his billion-dollar taxpayer-funded ballroom,” Schumer said on the Senate floor ahead of the vote-a-rama. “Amendment after amendment, vote after vote, Republicans are going to have to answer to the American people on tariffs, on skyrocketing costs, on the disastrous war with Iran, on the violence Trump’s masked agents have unleashed on our streets.”

All the wrangling over amendments added up to a slow start for a vote-a-rama that could easily stretch into the night.

The filibuster-proof bill is designed to fund immigration enforcement agencies through the rest of Trump’s term. Democrats have opposed that funding without imposing new restrictions on federal immigration agents to curb abuses.

While Trump had set a June 1 deadline for passing the bill, GOP leaders were hoping to pass it as early as this week through both chambers. But the Senate must still complete its vote-a-rama on amendments before sending the package to the House.

A House GOP leadership aide said the goal is to pass any legislation coming out of the Senate as quickly as possible, potentially teeing up a Rules Committee and floor vote on a rule as soon as Thursday night, with final passage on Friday.

Valerie Yurk contributed to this report.