“We don’t control our own border,” he claimed. “We’re going to confront the national security crisis on our southern border and we’re going to do it—one way or the other we have to do it.”
Trump is reportedly looking to reallocate more than $6 billion in federal funds to build his wall, and will also take the $1.375 billion Congress approved for 55 miles of new physical barriers as a compromise—one that Trump did not appreciate—in a bill that was meant to avoid another shutdown, which he is also expected to sign on Friday.
Needless to say Democrats are not pleased.
“Declaring a national emergency would be a lawless act, a gross abuse of the power of the presidency and a desperate attempt to distract from the fact that President Trump broke his core promise to have Mexico pay for his wall,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said in a statement Thursday. “It is yet another demonstration of President Trump’s naked contempt for the rule of law. This is not an emergency, and the President’s fearmongering doesn’t make it one.
Read the White House brief at the link below:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/president-donald-j-trumps-border-security-victory/
“The president’s actions clearly violate the Congress’s exclusive power of the purse, which our Founders enshrined in the Constitution,” the Democratic leaders added “The Congress will defend our constitutional authorities in the Congress, in the courts, and in the public, using every remedy available.”
And, as it turns out, some Republicans are not fond of the idea of a national emergency either.
Sens. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) all hinted that it was not a good idea to declare a national emergency as a tactic to build the wall.
“I’m disappointed with both the massive, bloated, secretive bill that just passed and with the president’s intention to declare an emergency to build a wall,” Paul tweeted on Thursday. “I, too, want stronger border security, including a wall in some areas. But how we do things matters. Over 1,000 pages dropped in the middle of the night and extraconstitutional executive actions are wrong, no matter which party does them.”
As CNN notes, there is sure to be a legal battle to ensue over this, especially since Democrats control the House.
The network notes that House Democrats could introduce a resolution to rescind the national emergency. If it passes the House floor, it would move on to the Senate, where they would have to vote on the resolution within a certain time frame. However, even if it did pass the Senate, which is still controlled by the GOP, Trump could still veto it.
And Trump remains confident that he can get away with whatever his plans are.
“We’ll win in the Supreme Court,” Trump declared.