Don’t get excited, Congress won’t give it to him. That’s not to say he shouldn’t ask for it because people want the wall and when Congress fights him while he releases numbers from the border that leave no doubt of an emergency situation, it will force Democrats to come up with a new excuse.
One that voters might buy. Here’s the thing. Trump must demand a complete budget in one bill. It didn’t work in 2018 because most of the government was already paid for and Democrats were happy to zero out the budget for ICE and the Border Patrol.
President Donald Trump on Monday will ask the U.S. Congress for an additional $8.6 billion to help pay for the wall he promised to build on the southern border with Mexico to combat illegal immigration and drug trafficking, officials familiar with his 2020 budget request told Reuters.
The demand is more than six times what Congress allocated for border projects in each of the past two fiscal years, and 6 percent more than Trump has corralled by invoking emergency powers this year.
Democrats, who oppose the wall as unnecessary and immoral, control the U.S. House of Representatives, making it unlikely the Republican president’s request will win congressional passage. Republicans control the Senate.
The proposal comes on the heels of a bruising battle with Congress over wall funding that resulted in a five-week partial federal government shutdown that ended in January and could touch off a sequel just ahead of a trifecta of ominous fiscal deadlines looming this fall.