Overview

• Booker blocked unanimous consent on a seven-bill bipartisan police funding package July 29, demanding an amendment to bar politically motivated grant allocations.
• He accused fellow Democrats of being complicit in President Trump’s strategy to withhold federal grants from blue states by advancing bills without safeguards.
• Senators Amy Klobuchar and Catherine Cortez Masto labeled his proposal a last-minute “poison pill” that threatened to derail critical bipartisan legislation.
• After his amendment failed, Booker withdrew objections to the Chief Herbert D. Proffitt Act and the Improving Police CARE Act, allowing those two measures to pass.
• The confrontation highlights a widening debate within the Democratic Party over leveraging congressional power and maintaining unity as elections approach.