“No deal was made last night on DACA. Massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent. Would be subject to vote,” Trump tweeted in a series of posts.
“The WALL, which is already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls, will continue to be built,” he wrote.
“Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military? Really! …They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own — brought in by parents at young age. Plus BIG border security,” Trump posted about DACA recipients.
Trump, in his series of tweets Thursday, did not deny reports that he would support a deal on DACA that didn’t include the wall.
And, in brief comments to reporters later Thursday, Trump said “the wall will come later” and that Republican congressional leaders were “on board” with the talks.
“We’re working on a plan, we’ll see how it works out,” he said as he was departing to tour the hurricane damage in Florida. “We’re going to get massive border security as part of that.”
“The wall will come later,” he added of his plan to build a wall along the Mexico border. “The wall is going to be built, it will be funded a little bit later.”
And when asked by a reporter if he supported amnesty, Trump cupped his hands to his lips and said, “DACA — the word is DACA.”
Trump added that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., backed the plan.
Two aides to Ryan, however, told NBC News that the Speaker had not talked to Trump since the the president dined Wednesday night with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.
Following that dinner, Pelosi and Schumer said they’d reached a deal with the president “to enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that’s acceptable to both sides.”
Schumer and Pelosi, in a joint statement Thursday morning, added that Trump’s tweets “are not inconsistent with the agreement reached last night.”
The pair said “there was no final deal” but that “both sides agreed that the wall would not be any part of this agreement.”
“The President made clear he intends to pursue it at a later time, and we made clear we would continue to oppose it,” they said.
Related: Trump, Dems Close to Deal on DACA
Dropping the demand for a border wall could make it easier for Republicans and Democrats to reach an agreement on DACA, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, which protects undocumented immigrants brought into the country as children.
Following the Wednesday night joint statement from Schumer and Pelosi, however, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders tweeted that, “While DACA and border security were both discussed, excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to.”
But earlier Wednesday, White House legislative affairs director Marc Short told an industry trade group that the border wall does not have to be a part of an agreement on DACA, one attendee at the meeting said.
The Trump administration announced last week that the Obama-era program would end in six months. The president said as part of the announcement that, “I am not going to just cut DACA off, but rather provide a window of opportunity for Congress to finally act.”
Ending DACA — a program allows undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children to remain and get work permits in the country — could affect as many as an estimated 800,000 people.
Sources told NBC News Wednesday night that Schumer and Pelosi told Trump they are prepared to deliver votes on a measure that would pair the existing DREAM Act text with additional border security that does not include the border wall funding. Specifics on what type and level of border security were not disclosed.
The DREAM Act would have offered those who came to the U.S. as children the opportunity to potentially gain permanent legal residency. The act was first introduced in August 2001 by Sen. Orin Hatch, R-Utah, and Dick Durbin, D-Ill. It has resurfaced several times, always failing to get through Congress.
Discussion of a possible deal marked the second time in as many weeks that Trump spurned his own party to pursue an agreement with Democrats. Last week, Trump struck a deal with Schumer and Pelosi that combined disaster aid for those affected by Hurricane Harvey with measures to keep the government open and extend the debt ceiling for three months, leaving some Republicans reeling.
News of another potential deal was met immediately with criticism from conservative Republicans.
Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, an anti-immigration hardliner tweeted Wednesday that, if there was an agreement, “Trump base is blown up, destroyed, irreparable, and disillusioned beyond repair. No promise is credible.”
A potential deal would also go against the views of former White House Chief Strategist Steve Bannon, who as a White House aide was credited with helping Trump emphasize a message centered on economic nationalism.
Bannon, who following his White House exit returned as the head of Breitbart News, told CBS’ “60 Minutes” last week he didn’t agree with Trump’s decision to give Congress a window to save DACA legislatively, and that “the guys in the far-right” and “on the conservative side” were “not happy” with it either.
Source: NBC
