Donald Trump is ready to give in on his demand for border wall funding from Congress and re-open the government, a new report claims.
After shutting down the government for going on three weeks while demanding funding for a border wall, Trump is now ready to give up the fight for Congress to give him the more than $5 billion funding he has demanded. The report came from MSNBC contributor and Democratic strategist Scott Dworkin , who reported that Trump is ready to have Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell hold a vote to re-open the government as early as Monday.
Dworkin claimed that Trump found an out with his latest threat to declare a national emergency in order to fund the border wall.
“He’s already got his cover story, acting like he found a new way to fund the wall without Congress,” Dworkin reported.
The report came hours after Donald Trump floated the idea of taking some extreme steps to get around the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives, which has vowed not to authorize any of the funding Trump is seeking to build a wall at the U.S. border.
“We can call a national emergency because of the security… I haven’t done it. I may do it but we can call a national emergency and build it very quickly,” Trump said in remarks to reporters on Friday, via CNN .
DONALD IS THE NATIONAL EMERGENCY. There is no emergency at the border except the one in his head Stephen Miller put there. #TrumpShutdown https://t.co/kMf8aqGHEE
— Barbara Malmet (@B52Malmet) January 4, 2019
In doing so, Trump claimed he would no longer need the approval of Congress in order to get the funding to build his wall.
“I haven’t done it. I may do it. I may do it,” he said. “We can call a national emergency and build it very quickly. It’s another way of doing it.”
The CNN report noted that Trump is now exploring ways to fund the wall through military funding, with Pentagon officials telling the news outlet that there is between $1 billion and $2 billion from the Defense Department budget that could be used instead. While that would not reach the total that Trump had been asking from Congress, it would allow the president to spin it as a victory, analysts claimed.
BREAKING: “Trump is caving,” GOP lobbyist tells me. It’s very likely Trump is going to have McConnell hold a vote, so he can sign bills to reopen the government possibly by Monday. He’s already got his cover story, acting like he found a new way to fund the wall without Congress.
— Scott Dworkin (@funder) January 5, 2019
With the president seeming to embrace this new method, Dworkin said a Republican lobbyist informed him that “Trump is caving” regarding his demands of Congress.
It is not clear if Donald Trump would be able to win his negotiations with Democrats in any regard. New House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has been steadfast in the stance not to give in on the border wall demands.
