No DREAMers-wall link?

Trump aide says DACA fix coming within weeks

WASHINGTON White House legislative director Marc Short said Tuesday that President Donald Trump is not insisting Congress fund a wall along the southern U.S. border as part of a legislative fix to address the fate of undocumented immigrants brought to the country as children.

The comments suggest the so-called DREAMers, those protected from deportation under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, may not become a bargaining chip in exchange for Trump’s border wall, a core campaign promise.

The fate of the DREAMers has been unclear since Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced earlier this month that Trump is ending the program but giving Congress six months to find a legislative solution. Trump plans to lay out priorities for a DACA fix within the next couple of weeks, Short said.

“We are most interested in getting border security, and the president has made a commitment to the American people that he believes that a physical barrier is important to that equation of border security,” Short told reporters at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast in Washington.

“Whether or not that is part of a DACA equation or whether or not that’s another legislative vehicle, I don’t want to bind ourselves into a construct that makes reaching a conclusion on DACA impossible,” he said.

On Sept . 5, Trump began winding down the Obama-era immigration program, and Sessions outlined the reasons the White House believes DACA is unconstitutional. Yet Trump also said at the time he has “great heart” for those protected under the program and that, if Congress doesn’t act, he would “revisit this issue.”

Amid a backlash to the decision and a couple days later, Trump appeared to soften his position about the DREAMers, tweeting they “have nothing to worry about.”

The White House now appears to be clearing the way for a deal on protecting DREAMers, a move which could have bipartisan backing in Congress.