House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday she will allow a floor vote on any bipartisan border security proposal crafted by congressional negotiators, but she drew a red line, insisting “there’s not going to be any wall money in the legislation.” Pelosi’s statement President Donald Trump to shoot back at Pelosi’s insistence that Congress will not fund the border wall.
Speaking to reporters at an Oval Office photo-op, the President said: “If there’s no wall, it doesn’t work. She’s just playing games.” Trump pushed his point, stating for instance that removing the border wall near Tijuana would show Californians — like Pelosi — how integral a barrier is to controlling the flow of immigrants into the United States.
“If you take down that wall you’ll have so many people coming into our country that Nancy Pelosi will be begging for a wall,” Trump predicted. “She’ll be begging for a wall. She will say ‘Please, please, Mr. President, give us a wall.'”
Pelosi said that congressional negotiators should be free to reach a “consensus of their own devices” but was confident that Democrats won’t allow the talks to produce an agreement that provides the necessary funding for a wall.
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