Democratic congressional leadership on Thursday criticized Republicans for scrambling for a strategy on border-wall funding.
“We’re right in the middle of a sort of meltdown on the part of the Republicans,” said incoming House speaker Nancy Pelosi, adding that the party is “in a state of disarray.”
“We’ll see what they come up with, in terms of disaster assistance,” Pelosi said. “But in terms of wall funding, that’s a non-starter. I think they know that.”
The government is scheduled to shut down after Friday when it runs out of funding for several departments. President Trump has flip-flopped on whether he will allow it to shut down over the $5 billion he wants for construction of his long-promised wall at the southern border, a request Democrats staunchly oppose.
A temporary continuing resolution was floated that would keep border security funding flat and delay a fight over it until February 8, but Trump informed Republicans he would not sign such a stopgap bill.
“We have very serious concerns about securing our border. The president said, ‘I will not sign this bill.’ So we’re going to go back and work on adding border security to this,” said House speaker Paul Ryan.
“Trump’s allies in the House can pound their fists on the table all they want but it’s not going to get a wall. They can, having caught the Trump temper tantrum fever, jump up and down, yell and scream. It’s not going to get a wall,” said Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer.
During a caustic Oval Office exchange earlier this month with Pelosi and Schumer, the president insisted that he would be “proud” to allow the government to shut down over good border security.
Later the White House seemed to retreat from those comments, saying it would find other ways to fund the wall.
However, on Thursday, Trump returned to his original hardline position.
“When I begrudgingly signed the Omnibus Bill, I was promised the Wall and Border Security by leadership. Would be done by end of year (NOW),” he wrote Thursday on Twitter. “It didn’t happen! We foolishly fight for Border Security for other countries – but not for our beloved U.S.A. Not good!”