Joshua Roberts/Reuters Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer
- Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer offered to fund part of President Donald Trump's wall in exchange for DACA protections as part of the shutdown negotiations.
- Trump agreed to the outlines of the deal, Schumer claimed, before backing out.
- Now, after the shutdown, Schumer has reportedly told the White House border wall funding is off the table.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is playing hardball on the border wall after making an offer to President Donald Trump during negotiations on government funding.
During a Friday meeting at the White House, just hours before the government shut down, Schumer offered Trump partial funding for his long-promised wall along the Mexican border in exchange for concessions on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) immigration program.
Trump initially agreed to the deal, Schumer said, before reversing course and rejecting the parameters a few hours later.
Now, according to Burgess Everett and Seung Min Kim at Politico, Schumer has taken the proposed wall funding off the table.
Schumer had offered the wall funding in exchange for protections for DACA recipients, the nearly 700,000 unauthorized immigrants that were brought to the US as minors and are shielded from deportation under the program.
Sen. Dick Durbin, the second-highest ranking Democratic senator, told Politico the wall deal was no longer on the table.
"He called the White House yesterday and said it's over," Durbin said.
A Democratic aide also told Politico that Trump "missed an opportunity to get the wall."
The DACA fight has only just begun. While Democrats backed off DACA demands and the government reopened on Monday, Schumer said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell agreed to hold open debate process to bring a DACA bill to the floor before the next shutdown deadline on February 8.
Trump announced he would rescind the program in September, but gave Congress six months to pass a law to codify it. That deadline is March 5.
Funding for the wall could have been a way to get Trump on board with a Senate solution to the DACA issue (which he so far seems reluctant to do), as well as overcome the seemingly insurmountable differences between the House and Senate.
Now, it appears the three weeks of negotiation to solve the DACA issue before the next shutdown will be even more fraught.