Trump Throws Down Ultimatum if Border Wall Doesn't Receive Funding
In a series of tweets Friday morning, President Donald Trump threatened to shut down the southern border if the border wall doesn’t receive funding.
According to Reuters, Democrats and the White House are still far apart on the funding for the wall.
The White House has requested $5 billion in wall funding and has partially shut down the government since last Friday.
The Democrats, meanwhile, have only offered $1.3 billion in funding for broader border security but not for a wall — a prospect they have long opposed.
Congress is in recess until next week. However, even before they go back into session, the president is firing salvos in order to keep the Democrats on their toes.
“We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with. Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!” Trump tweeted.
We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with. Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2018
He also said that due to bad trade deals, a shutdown of the border with Mexico and Central America could be a “profit making operation.”
….The United States looses soooo much money on Trade with Mexico under NAFTA, over 75 Billion Dollars a year (not including Drug Money which would be many times that amount), that I would consider closing the Southern Border a “profit making operation.” We build a Wall or…..
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2018
“The United States looses soooo much money on Trade with Mexico under NAFTA, over 75 Billion Dollars a year (not including Drug Money which would be many times that amount), that I would consider closing the Southern Border a ‘profit making operation,'” he wrote.
…..close the Southern Border. Bring our car industry back into the United States where it belongs. Go back to pre-NAFTA, before so many of our companies and jobs were so foolishly sent to Mexico. Either we build (finish) the Wall or we close the Border……
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2018
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“We build a Wall or close the Southern Border. Bring our car industry back into the United States where it belongs,” he continued.
“Go back to pre-NAFTA, before so many of our companies and jobs were so foolishly sent to Mexico. Either we build (finish) the Wall or we close the Border.”
Trump also claimed that another incipient caravan was heading our way from south of Mexico.
“Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador are doing nothing for the United States but taking our money,” Trump wrote.
“Word is that a new Caravan is forming in Honduras and they are doing nothing about it. We will be cutting off all aid to these 3 countries – taking advantage of U.S. for years!”
…..Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador are doing nothing for the United States but taking our money. Word is that a new Caravan is forming in Honduras and they are doing nothing about it. We will be cutting off all aid to these 3 countries – taking advantage of U.S. for years!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2018
And that’s not just “fake news,” either.
“Another migrant caravan — this one estimated at 15,000 people — is preparing to leave Honduras on Jan. 15, according to migrant rights advocates and Spanish-language media,” the Los Angeles Times reported Thursday.
“‘They say they are even bigger and stronger than the last caravan,’ said Irma Garrido, a member of the migrant advocacy group Reactiva Tijuana Foundation.”
“Meanwhile, thousands of Central American migrants from a caravan that left Honduras in October remain stranded at the U.S.-Mexico border and languishing in crowded Tijuana shelters while they wait out a lengthy process to file asylum requests with the United States.”
Neither Pelosi nor Schumer has tweeted in response to Trump as of noon on Friday.
However, it’s worth noting that both of them use the social media platform differently than the president, however. Pelosi’s feed seemed to involve several carefully crafted statements combined with a number of declarations about how she was upset about the #TrumpShutdown (in a manner that didn’t at all seem like a forced attempt at trying to make the hashtag a thing) and Schumer seems to be issuing statements that seem conspicuously similar to Pelosi’s.
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