President Donald Trump’s latest effort to build a wall across the US-Mexican border was by threatening to shutdown the government if the Congress doesn’t meet his request to sanction the $1.6 billion for the construction of the wall.
Addressing a crowd of supporters in Arizona, Trump said:
We are building a wall on the southern border, which is absolutely necessary. Now the obstructionist Democrats would like us not to do it, but believe me, [if] we have to close down our government, we are building that wall.
Trump also accused the Democrats of putting American security at risk for not supporting the proposal.
The House has passed a spending bill with funding for the border wall, but it faces an uncertain future in the Senate.
The last time the federal government was shut down was in 2013, during Barack Obama’s presidency, when the Congress could not agree on a bill to fund Obamacare.
Trump's fellow Republicans rebuked him on Wednesday, after his threat to shut down the US government over funding the border wall rattled markets, and cast a shadow over congressional efforts to raise the country's debt ceiling and pass spending bills.
I don’t think anyone’s interested in having a shutdown.Paul Ryan, House of Representatives Speaker
Ryan said building a wall along the country's border with Mexico to deter illegal immigration was necessary, but added that the government did not have to choose between border security and shuttering operations.
(With inputs from Reuters)
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