(National Sentinel) Build It: Perhaps in response to badgering from POTUS Donald Trump, perhaps in response to constituents, or perhaps in response to neverending waves of migrant caravans heading to the U.S., congressional Republicans appear to be seriously considering legislation that would fund construction of a border wall for two years — just as Democrats are poised to take control of the House.
Current border wall funding stands at about $1.6 billion, but the president wants 5 billion. Democrats, meanwhile, oppose spending more than $1.6 billion but until they take over the lower chamber in early January, they don’t yet have the numbers to stop a spending increase.
As a means of resolving the issue, however, majority Republicans may spread the $5 billion in funding over two federal fiscal years — which, if approved, would not be summarily defunded by the Democrat House because it would never make it past the GOP-controlled Senate or the president’s veto pen.
“We’re not there yet, but it makes sense to us,” said Senate Appropriations Committee Chairman Richard Shelby, R-Ala., according to The Hill.
Shelby said the president told him that $5 billion was essential. The measure that contains funding for the border wall has to be passed by Dec. 7 or the government could shut down — which, frankly, wouldn’t affect vital government functions like national security.
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“I think he would veto. He said he would veto at $1.6 (billion), so I take him at his word,” Shelby said Tuesday. He added that the Senate would not override Trump’s veto.
Some House Republicans, meanwhile, are urging GOP members in both chambers to get a funding bill done, especially after migrant invaders attempted to breach the U.S. border near San Diego en masse earlier this week.
I urge House leaders and the United States Congress to immediately pass a bill that would supply funds for a border wall—this week. Kicking the can down the road is no longer an option.
Read the rest of my @FoxNews op-ed here: https://t.co/rCxjxDBzvM #AZ05
— Rep Andy Biggs (@RepAndyBiggsAZ) November 27, 2018
“I urge House leaders and the United States Congress to immediately pass a bill that would supply funds for a border wall—this week. Kicking the can down the road is no longer an option,” Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., tweeted Tuesday.
The president told The Washington Post Tuesday that he would like to have Democrat votes but could find other ways to get a wall built.
“We need Democrat votes to have a wall,” Trump said.
“Now, if we don’t get it, will I get it done another way? I might get it done another way. There are other potential ways that I can do it. You saw what we did with the military, just coming in with the barbed wire and the fencing, and various other things,” POTUS said.
“We desperately need a wall,” the president continued. “I think that’s been shown better than ever in the last short period of two weeks — that we need a wall. I see the Democrats are going to want to do something, because they understand, too. Those pictures are very bad for the Democrats.”
For the record, walls work Rodney Scott, chief of the San Diego Border Patrol sector, told Fox News Monday night
“But in the meantime, I’d like to point out that not a single migrant climbed over the new border wall. We have about eight miles of border wall completed here in San Diego — unfortunately, that’s not complete. So the military came over in the last several weeks to help us fortify different areas, but it’s those weak areas where we have not upgraded the infrastructure that the migrants were able to breach.”
The fact is, the longer Congress vacillates on building the wall, the more illegal immigration — and migrant caravans — it invites.
Speaking of caravans, new ones are already forming…
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