Showdown looms as Trump demands funding for wall on U.S.-Mexico border

[Amica Nostra 4,803]

 

https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/showdown-looms-as-trump-demands-funding-for-wall-on-us-mexico-border/2017/04/23/5e0a2840-276a-11e7-b503-9d616bd5a305_story.html?utm_term=.a9b8b7f5b8f6

 

President Trump and White House officials pressed congressional Republicans on Sunday to use the looming threat of a government shutdown to win funding for a wall along the border between the United States and Mexico, a top priority for the administration as it nears the symbolic 100-day mark.

Trump wants funding to be included in a spending measure that would keep the government open past April 28, a determined effort that has prompted a possible standoff with lawmakers in both parties, who hope to avert a federal closure next weekend.

Trump’s push for fast action on his pledge to build the border wall is part of a mounting and, at times, tense scramble inside the administration to kick-start the president’s agenda, even if it risks dire political consequences. It follows weeks of frustration within the White House over inaction and stalemates on Capitol Hill over big-ticket items such as health care and tax cuts.

White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus said in an interview Sunday with The Washington Post that the president and his advisers remain “strong” in their commitment to securing funding for border security and a wall.

“This is what the president ran on,” Priebus said. “We want to get to a place this week where ­border-security money is being directed to the Department of Homeland Security so that we can begin surveillance and preliminary work, and then we will keep working on getting DHS what it needs for the structure.”

“The burden to keep it open is on the Republicans,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), above, said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “Building a wall is not an answer. Not here or any place.” (Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP)

The timing promises a week of high drama on the Hill. The Senate returns Monday night, and the House returns Tuesday from a two-week recess, leaving just three days when both chambers will be in session to wrangle out a funding agreement. Negotiators worked throughout the break, but thus far a deal has not been struck.

The wall, which experts say would cost $21.6 billion and take 3½ years to construct, has emerged as a crucial sticking point for the White House, with the president insisting privately and publicly that progress toward its funding and eventual construction must be showcased this week.

“Congress is right to be nervous, but that’s Trump’s style to be aggressive, ambitious, right out of ‘The Art of the Deal,’ ” said William J. Bennett, a conservative commentator and close friend of House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.). “Everyone seems to be getting used to that and how Trump doesn’t want the half loaf but the whole loaf.”In a tweet Sunday, Trump elbowed Democrats who have resisted his call to include wall funding. He chastised them for not wanting “money from the budget going to the border wall despite the fact that it will stop drugs” and gang activity, in his view.

Trump added that he would continue to ask Mexico to pay for the project, another bold proclamation he made during the campaign. Meanwhile, he said, he will press Congress for funding “so we can get started early” on the “badly needed border wall.”

[spookyturtle 9,466]

How about spending the $20 billion on infrastructure? The wall won't stop the drugs, too many dirty citizens on this side making a boatload of money. 

[IAMX 3,055]

Shouldn't be that much a problem, get it done, step up enforcement, build the catapults to toss some illegals back over.

[eieio 1,594]

We should set a few of these ialong the border. A visual persuasion to obey the law

 

Edited April 24, 2017 by eieio

[CaliCat 3,957]

11 hours ago, spookyturtle said:

How about spending the $20 billion on infrastructure? The wall won't stop the drugs, too many dirty citizens on this side making a boatload of money. 

 

Because when you put money into infrastructure people see it. You can't say that you build a road or repaired a bridge when people can see and document that you didn't. When you're building a wall in the middle of the desert, you can make accommodation for money and supply to be creatively accounted for. In addition, he offered the wall contract to a friend of his.

 

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-01-31/miami-billionaire-perez-rejects-his-friend-trump-s-wall-overture

 

 

Miami real estate tycoon Jorge Perez said he declined an invitation by President Donald Trump to help build a wall along the U.S. border with Mexico, describing the plan as “idiotic.”

Perez, a billionaire who has built Trump-branded towers in South Florida, said the president e-mailed him after the inauguration with plans for the wall and asked if he’d be interested in working on it. In an interview at the offices of his company, Related Group, the Argentine-born developer said he politely declined and joked about which side of the barrier he would end up on.

He spoke in stronger terms in Monday’s interview. Financing the wall with a border tax on imports would mean the cost will ultimately be passed on to U.S. consumers, and protectionism could risk triggering a trade war with Mexico, Perez said.

“The wall is the most idiotic thing I’ve ever seen or heard in my life,” said Perez, who was raised in Colombia by Cuban parents. “A wall for what? You think a wall is going to stop people that are hungry? Good employment in Mexico, economic growth in Mexico, equality is going to stop people from coming over the border.”

Edited April 24, 2017 by CaliCat

[smilesammich 10,727]

 

[Amica Nostra 4,803]

How about a compromise? When Mexico sends the money, we build the wall.

[smilesammich 10,727]

[smilesammich 10,727]

4 minutes ago, ccneat said:

How about a compromise? When Mexico sends the money, we build the wall.

how bout, when trump locks up hillary, we'll believe him on the mexico paying for the wall claim too..

[Mr&Mrs G. 903]

If the wall was built would the US not save on policing costs? 

 

I seen an interview not too long ago and it was a Mexican born professor living in the US. He was totally against the wall but refused to condemn Mexico for how tough/strict it protects it's own southern border. His belief was the US is a country of immigrants and the wall goes against it's history. 

 

 

 

 

[CaliCat 3,957]

6 minutes ago, Mr&Mrs G. said:

If the wall was built would the US not save on policing costs? 

 

I seen an interview not too long ago and it was a Mexican born professor living in the US. He was totally against the wall but refused to condemn Mexico for how tough/strict it protects it's own southern border. His belief was the US is a country of immigrants and the wall goes against it's history. 

 

 

A wall won't stop the drugs from coming in. It will do nothing to protect the country. Trump himself probably knew it work as a campaign talk point, but it has very little chance of becoming a reality. There are points on the border where a wall exists, and it yet drugs keep on pouring into the country. 

Edited April 24, 2017 by CaliCat

[OriZ 3,157]

1 hour ago, smilesammich said:

 

Hilarious that was in Burlington considering only 11% of the people here voted for him lol

[smilesammich 10,727]

Just now, OriZ said:

Hilarious that was in Burlington considering only 11% of the people here voted for him lol

a shame 11% of vermont is brain dead. 

[CaliCat 3,957]

2 minutes ago, OriZ said:

Hilarious that was in Burlington considering only 11% of the people here voted for him lol

 

He proved O'Malley right.  Trump is a carnival barker. 

[Transborderwife 4,666]

1 hour ago, Mr&Mrs G. said:

If the wall was built would the US not save on policing costs? 

 

I seen an interview not too long ago and it was a Mexican born professor living in the US. He was totally against the wall but refused to condemn Mexico for how tough/strict it protects it's own southern border. His belief was the US is a country of immigrants and the wall goes against it's history. 

 

 

 

 

Many argue that having a human wall of guards would cost about the same and be more helpful in the end