Joe Biden ended last week on a very bad note. This week is starting off no better for him.

On Friday, his administration took several hits straight to the chin. The drone strike that he once lauded as taking out ISIS-K in Kabul? Innocent civilians killed, including seven children. Those COVID booster shots that Biden had promised were coming? The FDA told him no. That deal to make sure that Australia gets nuclear submarines? France was so mad about the deal that they actually recalled their ambassadors from the United States and the United Kingdom. (As a side note, that one cannot be in any way, shape, or form, be pinned on Donald Trump – and it doesn’t speak well of Biden’s supposed “foreign policy expertise” if his team couldn’t forsee the potential diplomatic feathers that were going to be ruffled.)

No wonder Biden hit the beach over the weekend, and tried to pretend he had not a care in the world except riding his bicycle. Unfortunately for all of us, he’s going to be coming back to the White House, where he will be greeted with this piece of news: the Senate parliamentarian has ruled that Biden’s plans for immigration “reform” cannot be part of the $3.5 trillion social spending plan that the Democrat-run Senate wants to pass via reconciliation.

New – Senate parl ruling on immigration that appears to close the door on including a pathway to green cards in the reconciliation bill. Key line: “Changing the law to clear the way to LPR status is tremendous and enduring policy change that dwarfs its budgetary impact.” pic.twitter.com/KOYdrKtcsB

— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) September 20, 2021

This is definitely not what Biden and his cronies in the Senate wanted to hear.

The decision by Elizabeth MacDonough, the Senate’s nonpartisan interpreter of its often enigmatic rules, is a damaging and disheartening setback for President Joe Biden, congressional Democrats and their allies in the pro-immigration and progressive communities. It badly wounds Democrats’ hopes of unilaterally enacting — over Republican opposition — changes letting several categories of immigrants gain permanent residence and possibly citizenship.”

The parliamentarian opinion is crucial because it means the immigration provisions could not be included in an immense $3.5 trillion measure that’s been shielded from GOP filibusters. Left vulnerable to those bill-killing delays, which require 60 Senate votes to defuse, the immigration language has virtually no chance in the 50-50 Senate.”

In a three-page memo to senators obtained by The Associated Press, MacDonough noted that under Senate rules, provisions are not allowed in such bills if their budget effect is “merely incidental” to their overall policy impact.”

Citing sweeping changes that Democrats would make in immigrants’ lives, MacDonough, a one-time immigration attorney, said the language “is by any standard a broad, new immigration policy.”

Awww. The Democrats’ planned end-run to legalize the “Dreamers” at one fell swoop, instead of actually having to pass a palatable bill on immigration, just got body-slammed (by a former immigration lawyer, no less). Chuck Schumer has a sad now.

We are deeply disappointed in this decision but the fight to provide lawful status for immigrants in budget reconciliation continues.

We will continue fighting to pursue the best path forward to grant them the ability to obtain lawful status.

My statement: pic.twitter.com/5VZjx0D6JT

— Chuck Schumer (@SenSchumer) September 20, 2021

You can tell from the tenor of his statement that they are going to try and sweet-talk the parlimentarian into it, but they already know that it’s a losing battle. The only remaining play would be to abolish the filibuster, but even that would be impossible to do so long as Manchin and Sinema are holdouts. As the 2022 midterms look more and more to be a referendum on the failures of Team Biden (though they will definitely try to invoke Trump, a very desperate manuever because he won’t be on the ballot in 2022), they are beginning to realize that it’s now or never for these huge budget bills and precedent-shattering rule changes.

And naturally, the Squad is frothing at the mouth about this. Ilhan Omar and Ayanna Pressley are already – from their House seats – pushing for the Democrats to just ignore or fire the parlimentarian so that they can just do what they want. I mean, sure, they could do that, but MacDonough became the parlimentarian in 2012 when the Democrats were in control of the Senate, and the Senate Democrats don’t seem ready to burn the place down on the say-so of the Squad Brain Trust – especially when the optics of unchecked illegal immigration are so blatantly apparent.

The Haitian illegal immigrants that have been flooding into Del Rio, Texas, who spread the word that there would be no deportations, are suddenly finding themselves back on planes to Haiti.

More than 320 migrants arrived in Port-au-Prince on three flights, and Haiti said six flights were expected Tuesday. In all, U.S. authorities moved to expel many of the more 12,000 migrants camped around a bridge in Del Rio, Texas, after crossing from Ciudad Acuña, Mexico.”

The U.S. plans to begin seven expulsion flights daily on Wednesday, four to Port-au-Prince and three to Cap-Haitien, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly. Flights will continue to depart from San Antonio but authorities may add El Paso, the official said.”

Unfortunately, this problem isn’t going to be going away. Only single men are being deported back to Haiti.

NEW: U.S. Border Patrol Chief Raul Ortiz says there are currently 12,600 migrants under the bridge in Del Rio. Told me single adult men will be expelled via Title 42, but most family units will be processed and released into US w/ NTA (notice to appear). @FoxNews pic.twitter.com/JhaS3YB4pX

— Bill Melugin (@BillFOXLA) September 19, 2021

Does anyone think that even a bare majority of those “family units” who get NTAs will ever walk into a courtroom? And the Democrats have the nerve to act sad when the parliamentarian points out the obvious issues at play with trying to grant legal status to tens of thousands of people through a reconciliation budget bill?

Considering what is waiting for him at the White House today, Joe Biden may opt to extend his weekend.

Featured image via Proulain on Pixabay, cropped, Pixabay license