WASHINGTON—Todd Blanche, the acting attorney general, and a team of White House aides arrived at a hastily organized meeting near the Senate chamber hoping to reassure Republicans about a $1.776 billion “anti-weaponization fund” promoted by President Trump.
Sen. Tom Cotton, a Trump ally from Arkansas, wasn’t having it.
“Who thought this was a good idea? Who chose this timing?” Cotton asked bluntly inside the Senate’s ornate Mike Mansfield Room, pressing Blanche, White House legislative affairs director James Braid and others about the fund with a series of point-blank questions, according to people familiar with the tense exchange.
Cotton was far from alone—more than a dozen Republican senators grilled Blanche about the settlement in the two-hour meeting, the people said, questioning its merit and warning that it could derail approval of a $70 billion multiyear package funding immigration enforcement.
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