It came as little surprise when Republicans on Capitol Hill decided this month that the first bill they would push through Congress in the Trump era would be one to make it easier to deport immigrants accused of minor crimes.
After all, President-elect Donald J. Trump won election in November, sweeping Republicans to unified control of Congress, after a campaign promising a severe immigration crackdown.
What was less expected was what came next: Dozens of Democrats in the House and a smaller but critical bloc in the Senate joined the G.O.P. in pushing the legislation to the brink of enactment, culminating in a test vote on Friday that cleared the final hurdle to its passage.
It was an outcome that exposed major divisions among Democrats about how to position themselves on immigration, and foreshadowed the immense challenge of maintaining unity on a pressing topic that Mr. Trump has made his signature issue. After years of opposing Mr. Trump’s immigration agenda at every turn, some Democrats — particularly those who are looking toward potentially tough re-election campaigns — appear to have concluded that “hell no” is not a winning strategy, at least not in every case.
The dynamic was on display last week in the House, when 48 Democrats joined Republicans in supporting the Laken Riley Act, which would mandate the detention and potential deportation of undocumented migrants charged with burglary, theft, larceny or shoplifting. Representative Ritchie Torres, a New York Democrat whose Bronx district swung 22 points toward Mr. Trump, backed the bill after having opposed it 10 months ago.
“You have to meet people where they are, even if your ideological priors might lead you in a different direction,” Mr. Torres, who is exploring a run for governor, said in an interview. “I do worry that when we vote against bills like the Laken Riley Act, we run the risk of seeming out of touch with most Americans on the issue of immigration and border security.”
Mr. Torres said he was fully aware that Republicans had brought up the bill partly as a strategy to make Democrats’ positions on immigration appear extreme. But the correct response, he argued, was to simply accept what they were proposing, depriving them of the chance to score a political point.
“These bills are meant to put us in the position of defending what seems indefensible to most Americans,” Mr. Torres added. “Why should we allow the Republicans to continue to demagogue and weaponize the issue of immigration and border security against us?”
A similar scene unfolded in the Senate, where the bill — which died last year when Democrats in the chamber declined to take it up — drew the support of 10 Democrats in a test vote on Friday. That positioned it to clear Congress next week and quickly be signed by Mr. Trump. Four of those Democrats will face voters next year, and five represent states Mr. Trump carried in November.
“There was a blinding flash of common sense,” Senator John Fetterman, Democrat of Pennsylvania and a cosponsor of the bill, said this week when asked why he thought more people in his party were lining up to support it. “I never suggested that it necessarily is a perfect bill, but I think it’s an appropriate one, and I think it’s a necessary one.”
(Mr. Fetterman did not vote on Friday, though he has been outspoken in making the case for why Democrats should support the bill.)
The action in both chambers offered a real-time glimpse of how Republicans have succeeded in using immigration to divide Democrats, effectively forcing them to choose between two unappealing options. They could oppose the bill on principle, and risk appearing to voters as though they were against locking up and deporting undocumented criminals. Or they could embrace it, ignoring their concerns that the measure could deprive immigrants of due process, and potentially lead to detaining and removing people who were wrongly accused.
A majority of Democrats stood firm in opposition, arguing that they need not sacrifice their values to win a messaging battle on immigration that Republicans had rigged against them.
“I don’t think we need to let Republicans dictate to us the terms upon which we convince voters that we are the better party in immigration,” said Senator Christopher S. Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut and a lead negotiator of a bipartisan immigration deal that Republicans killed last year at Mr. Trump’s behest.
He said Democrats should instead change their messaging strategy, talking about border security “all the time” and not ceding so much airtime to Republicans on the issue.
But others, including Democrats from competitive districts or areas that swung heavily toward Mr. Trump in the election, backed the measure. Among the 10 who supported it in Friday’s Senate test were a handful from states Mr. Trump carried in November: Senators Catherine Cortez Masto and Jacky Rosen of Nevada, Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly of Arizona, and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan. Another group that backed it is up for re-election next year: Senators Jon Ossoff of Georgia, Gary Peters of Michigan, Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire and Mark Warner of Virginia.
Some Democrats who supported the measure argued it was better simply to concede the point and vote in favor of the bill, deflating Republican efforts to characterize them as lax on crime or illegal immigration.
“We should embrace that idea of securing the border and deporting criminals,” Representative Tom Suozzi, Democrat of New York, said last week on Fox News. He added that it would be a “big mistake” for Democrats to oppose such measures.
Mr. Suozzi, who represents Long Island, won a special election last year to replace the disgraced former Representative George Santos largely by talking about the need for border security and enforcement — two issues that arguably lost Democrats the majority in 2022. His victory was a model that others in the party tried to emulate in the lead-up to November, with mixed success.
Still, many Democrats said they were disappointed and frustrated that their colleagues would compromise their principles in a bid to mitigate attack ads or score political points with voters.
“Democrats will not win by abdicating our values and being Republican-like,” said Representative Ro Khanna, Democrat of California. “What we have to do is say: ‘We are for a secure border. We are for deporting people convicted of violent felonies. But we don’t change our values.’”
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