Without interference, I believe our two
parties can come together on an agreement by the end of the week. The
four-corner negotiations--that is Leader McConnell, Speaker Ryan,
Leader Pelosi, and I--have been going very well, and a monkey wrench
was thrown into them. I will caution: If the administration insists on poison pill riders
or extraneous funding requests, then our talks could get sidetracked,
particularly if the administration demands funding for a border wall. Democrats have been long clear that the border wall is a nonstarter. More than a month ago, here on the floor, from this desk, I warned
against including funding for the border wall in any must-pass
government spending bill. If the administration insists on funding for
a wall in this bill, it will endanger the prospects of a bill's passing
and raise the prospects of a government shutdown because a border wall,
we believe, is a pointless waste of taxpayer money for several reasons. First, President Trump promised that Mexico would pay for the wall,
not American taxpayers. The idea that President Trump is fulfilling a
campaign promise when he says that America will pay for the wall now
and Mexico will pay it back later is untrue.
Keywords matched
border wall