The US president, who had vowed to build a wall on the country’s southern border and make Mexico pay for it, has been pushing the Republican-controlled Congress to include funding for it in the next spending bill.
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US President Donald Trump indicated an openness to delaying his push to secure funds for his promised border wall with Mexico, potentially eliminating a sticking point as lawmakers worked to avoid a looming shutdown of the federal government.
Trump had requested Congress provide United States funds to begin the wall, but signalled on Monday that he would not insist on it, saying he might be willing to wait until September for the funding.
Trump campaigned throughout the country past year promising a wall across the entire 2,200 mile southern border, promising that Mexico would pay for it.
If there is a “government shutdown”, it will be Democrats, not the president, who are to blame.
In one prospective deal, reported by The Hill on Tuesday, Democrats would agree to only a $15 billion increase in military spending, in exchange for Republicans agreeing to fund healthcare subsidies.
“Listen to the way he defines it – that’s what we’re working on”, said Sen. And we’re not going to allow any dollars in any kind of border security appropriation to be used for a wall.
With the wall issue likely out of the way – at least for now – leaders in both parties are optimistic that a budget deal will get done before Friday’s midnight deadline, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
The U.S. and Mexico now cooperate in fighting drug cartels, but Videgaray said that if upcoming talks about immigration and trade with the U.S. go poorly, Mexico “will have to review our existing cooperation”.
But Trump’s comments earned a swift rebuke Tuesday from prominent conservatives, including radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh, who told his millions of listeners that Trump is “caving on his demand” for money to build a border wall. “We also know that that can happen later this year and into next year”. But in the meantime, members of Congress might learn something from the White House. “We’re already preparing. We’re doing plans, we’re doing specifications, we’re doing a lot of work on the wall, and the wall is going to get built”.
Despite the short time frame for must-pass funding legislation, White House spokesman Sean Spicer said Monday that the administration remained “very confident” that a spending deal will be reached by the end of Friday.
Both efforts come with Congress back from a two-week break just days before Trump’s 100th day in office, an unofficial measuring stick of a new president’s effectiveness.
“I think there’s still question marks about ‘wait a minute, this is a guy that said Mexicans are going to pay for it and now it’s going on a spending bill that is borne by the U.S. taxpayer, ‘” U.S. Rep. Mark Sanford, R-S.C., cautioned on CNN over the weekend.
Nevertheless, it will be near impossible for Republican leadership to sell all its spending concessions to the entirety of its conference – especially once conservatives realize just how much their party has to concede.
Republicans, meanwhile, expressed confidence Congress would avoid a shutdown.
“I’m not convinced that cutting taxes is necessarily going to blow a hole in the deficit”, said Utah GOP Sen.
The best possible explanation for the White House in all of this is that there was/is simply confusion about what fiscal year Trump was talking about.
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Trump may have been bluffing all along to distract the left into thinking this budget battle would be all about the wall.
