Federal government shutdown enters its second week with no resolution in sight

WASHINGTON — Republicans debated the definition of the border wall that President Donald Trump is demanding to reopen the federal government as the shutdown entered its second week Sunday with both parties continuing to dig in and shift blame.

Days before the start of a new Congress – and Trump’s first experience with divided government, there were no signs of direct negotiations involving the president, Republicans and Democrats to end the partial closure, affecting hundreds of thousands of increasingly anxious federal workers.

The conflict centers on Trump’s wish for a physical wall at the U.S.-Mexi- co border, but even the nature of that demand became freshly mired in controversy after John Kelly, the outgoing White House chief of staff, said the administration had long since moved away from the concrete barrier Trump has often described in rapturous terms.

“To be honest, it’s not a wall,” Kelly

told the Los Angeles Times for a story published Sunday, adding that “we left a solid concrete wall early on in the administration, when we asked people what they needed and where they needed it.” Recently, Trump has taken to describing a wall made of “steel slats.”

“The wall has become a metaphor for border security. What we’re talking about is a physical barrier where it makes sense,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who spoke to reporters after a White House lunch with Trump on Sunday. He emerged suggesting that the president might win over Democrats by trading wall funding for an extension of legal status for certain immigrants whom Trump has threatened to deport.

Trump counselor Kellyanne Conway said Sunday morning that it was a “silly semantic argument” to debate what the border wall would be made of and sought to blame Democrats for refusing to compromise on the president’s demand for billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars for a wall. During the campaign, Trump repeatedly said Mexico would pay for the wall.

“There may be a wall in some places. There may be steel slats. There may be technological enhancements,” she said on Fox News Sunday. “But always saying wall or no wall is being very disingenuous and turning a complete blind eye to what is a crisis at the border.”

A Trump-backed spending bill passed by House Republicans on Dec. 21 included more than $5 billion in border security funding that could be spent on a wall, but that measure has not gotten traction in the Senate, where Democrats have stood firm on holding wall funding to the current $1.3 billion level.

Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., speaking on CBS’ “Face the Nation,” said the Trump administration has “spent very little” of the $1.3 billion that Congress allotted for physical border security improvements earlier this year.

“He says he needs more, yet there’s no plan (for) how the money is going to be spent or any analysis on what’s most effective to secure the border,” said Tester, the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations subcommittee on Homeland Security. “I think we can do it with technology and manpower, and much more effectively than with a wall.”

To the extent that Republicans back off demands for a physical wall, that could open opportunities for compromise to break the impasse.

Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, said congressional Democrats are “certainly prepared to provide additional funding for enhanced fencing, technology, drones, satellites, lighting, censors, cellphone towers and the things the experts have clearly indicated would improve our border security” but held firm against a physical wall.

“What Donald Trump and the Republicans want to do is waste $5 billion in taxpayer money on an ineffective medieval border wall that is a 5th century solution to a 21st century problem,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”

While those officials and others jousted on the Sunday television news programs, there was no effort at direct talks between the warring parties.

Trump tweeted Saturday that he was “in the White House waiting for the Democrats to come on over and make a deal on Border Security.” Top Democrats, meanwhile, said they had made their position against additional wall funding known and awaited a counteroffer from Trump and Republicans.

“Our negotiations are at an impasse at the moment,” said Sen. Richard Shelby, R-Ala., chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, on “Face the Nation.”