Trump budget chief demands money for wall
Mulvaney says ‘elections have consequences’
WASHINGTON — White House budget director Mick Mulvaney says that Democratic negotiators on a massive spending bill need to agree to fund top priorities of President Donald Trump such as a down payment on a border wall and hiring of additional immigration agents.
Mulvaney told The Associated Press in an interview that “elections have consequences” and that “we want wall funding” as part of the catchall spending bill, which lawmakers hope to unveil next week.
The former GOP congressman from South Carolina also said that the administration is open, though undecided, about a key Democratic demand that the measure pay for cost-sharing payments to insurance companies that help low-income people afford health policies under the Affordable Care Act.
The $1 trillion-plus legislation is leftover business from last year’s election-season gridlock and would cover the operating budgets of every Cabinet department except for Veterans Affairs.
Talks on the measure have hit a rough patch as a deadline to avert a government shutdown looms late next week. Trump’s presidency is approaching the symbolic 100-day mark, but his GOP allies in Congress have been tempering expectations that the president would emerge as a big winner. Democratic votes are likely to be needed to pass whatever bill emerges from the talks, and Senate Democrats could bottle it up entirely if they object to provisions that they deem to be “poison pills” — such as the money for the wall.
GOP leaders on Capitol Hill are eager to avert a shutdown, and the slow pace may make it necessary to enact another temporary spending bill to avert a shutdown next weekend.
“A shutdown is never a desired end and neither is it a strategy,” Mulvaney said.
Mulvaney said the White House delivered an offer to negotiators Wednesday night, with funding for the border wall a top demand. Other items on the White House priority list, Mulvaney said, are a $30 billion request for a cash infusion for the military and a controversial provision to give the administration greater latitude to deny certain federal grants to “sanctuary cities” that refuse to cooperate with immigration enforcement by federal authorities.
“We want wall funding. We want (immigration) agents. Those are our priorities,” Mulvaney said. “We know there are a lot of people on the Hill, especially in the Democratic Party, who don’t like the wall, but they lost the election. And the president should, I think, at least have the opportunity to fund one of his highest priorities in the first funding bill under his administration.”
He said the wall is “something that’s a tremendous priority for us and that clearly was a seminal issue in the 2016 presidential race.” Trump also repeatedly promised that Mexico would pay for the wall. But its cost, expected to exceed $20 billion, would likely be borne by taxpayers. And some Republicans are opposed to the wall as well, instead preferring to spend more on technologies such as sensors and drone aircraft to beef up border security.
Democrats have taken a hard line against any money for the border wall and insist that the measure include the “Obamacare” payments to insurance companies.
At issue are cost-sharing payments that are a key subsidy under the health care law.