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Chuck Schumer touts bipartisan relationship with McConnell: 'I got 99 problems but Mitch ain't one'

Feb 1, 2024, 22:39 IST
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Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer at the Capitol on December 12, 2023.Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images
  • Sen. Chuck Schumer made a Jay-Z reference when touting his relationship with Mitch McConnell.
  • "I guess you could say I've got 99 problems but Mitch ain't one," Schumer joked.
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Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer made a Jay-Z reference when speaking about his bipartisan relationship with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

In an address to the annual Congressional Dinner on Wednesday night, Schumer noted that there are "very different opinions in the Senate" about a major national security bill that would make changes to US immigration policy while providing billions in aid to Ukraine and Israel.

But as the ongoing negotiations take heat from both the right and the left, Schumer and McConnell have remained relatively united on the issue.

"As our century seems more and more divided, Leader McConnell and I have been working very hard to move negotiations forward and keep the spirit of bipartisanship alive," said Schumer. "I guess you could say I've got 99 problems but Mitch ain't one."

It was a pun on Jay-Z's 2003 hit "99 Problems," the lyrics of which include the line: "I got 99 problems but a bitch ain't one."

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It's an uncommon, though not entirely unfamiliar, place for the two party leaders to be. The duo worked together during the last few years on a bipartisan infrastructure bill, changes to the Electoral Count Act, and the CHIPS and Science Act in a bipartisan fashion as well.

That's despite years of prior acrimony, particularly over McConnell's refusal to hold confirmation hearings for then-Supreme Court Justice nominee Merrick Garland in 2016, only to rush through the confirmation of Justice Amy Coney Barrett in 2020.

There are plenty of other problems for both Schumer and McConnell as they look to move the national security package forward.

Republicans have blasted the proposed changes to immigration law as being too soft, with former President Donald Trump describing it as an "open borders betrayal."

"Please blame it on me," Trump said of the bill's possible failure.

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Meanwhile, a growing number of Senate Democrats are concerned not just about changes to immigration laws — which would be significantly toughened under the proposed bill — but about US aid to Israel, in light of the ongoing devastation in Gaza.

And that's not even accounting for some GOP senators' opposition to further Ukraine aid: the bill would include tens of billions of dollars for the eastern European country, which continues to battle a Russian invasion.

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