Amid opposition, Trump makes low budget request for Mexico border wall

President Donald Trump is asking Congress for $1.6 billion to begin building a wall along the border with Mexico, far short of the amount needed for a project sharply criticized by Democrats and even some conservative Republicans.

An internal Department of Homeland Security (DHS) plan in February estimated the total cost for the wall at $21.6 billion, but the White House's budget proposal for 2018, released in full on Tuesday, included a request for just $1.6 billion.

Two Republican aides in Congress said the modest request is an acknowledgement from the White House that full funding is not realistic given opposition from Freedom Caucus conservatives in the House of Representatives as well as Democrats in the House and the Senate.

Unless Trump is able to rally broader support and win more funding for construction in another fiscal year, his plans for a "big beautiful wall" that he promised during his election campaign last year may not be realized, the aides said.

The budget, which includes 10-year projections for spending for most areas of the government, did not include a 10-year plan for funding wall construction. "We are absolutely dead serious about the wall," White House budget director Mick Mulvaney told reporters on Tuesday.

To any who are still following this semi-incoherent mish-mash between DoughtyOne (D1) and me, my post #3, copied below, is what all the fuss is about.

“Trump’s expressed plan for paying for the wall: Mexico will pay. Not gonna happen. Trump’s implicit plan for paying for the wall: America will pay, but will benefit from the protection and will absorb the cost because of the greater wealth derived from Trump’s economic plan. It’s happening. Just wish he’d been straightforward about these implied ways of paying for the wall from the beginning.”

D1 attacked me with accusations ad infinitum, ad nauseum, that I “declaring it a major failure on this topic” which is untrue as you can see. D1 refused to acknowledge the entire post which applauded Trump’s efforts. The inference in the post is failure to have Mexico is a nit because Trump’s economic plan will more than make up for it. But I did and do call Trump to task for repeatedly promising something he couldn’t deliver – that Mexico would pay for the wall. That is our job as American citizens and Trump supporters, not becoming blind “yes men” as D1 is.

I will continue to hold elected officials including Trump who I greatly admire accountable for their promises which is what all of us should do. Electing a politician is like a treaty with a foreign government. You’re giving them power based on promises made. So, as Reagan said, you “TRUST BUT VERIFY”. I don’t know why Trump often repeated how Mexico would pay for the wall. What D1 deliberately or obtusely misses entirely in his eagerness to attack and accuse me is the obvious point that building the wall is important, not how it’s paid for. The issue of Mexico paying for the wall is only relevant because it is what Trump repeatedly promised. The truth is Trump in this request for money from Congress did fail to keep this promise. That’s important. But it certainly is not a “major failure” regarding building the wall or protecting American citizens or in what I posted, as D1 obfuscates.

The Mexico paying for the wall thing was a fun line for rallies, but did anyone really think that was true?

I've been saying that for the last year and a half here on FR - that the tariffs he proposed would be paid by American consumers, not Mexico - and you can't believe the crap I got for saying it. Either a lot of FReepers believed it or they, like this D1, hated the idea that someone would challenge Trump about anything.

Not sure Trump really had to keep saying that and I don't like that he did because it wasn't true. At the same time, protecting our citizens and our borders is primary. Who pays for it is secondary. But a politician should be accountable for his promise IMO even if it wasn't necessary for him to make that particular promise. The BIG promise he is keeping is about protecting and strengthening America. God bless him for that.

Maybe it’s because I’ve been a Howard Stern fan since the early 90s, but I felt like I knew how to translate Trump into English.

The big mistake I made is that I assumed the voters would eventually become upset that what Trump said didn’t always mean what he said and sometimes contradicted other stuff he said. He bonded with them in a powerful way.

I do think that some of this has to affect him at some point. I’ll be honest, I don’t think a big beautiful wall is ever going to be built nor was it really ever intended to be built. At least not the way, people interpreted it. That could lose him some support but who the hell even knows at this point?

The general rule with Trump is that you have to take his specific statements and generalize them, and then take his general statement and make them specific.

“Build a wall and Mexico is going to pay for it.” = Tougher border enforcement and general scare tactics limiting illegal immigration and ultimately saving the US money.

“I was against the war in Iraq” = a move towards isolationism/an end towards interventionism.

“Many people are saying” = this one specific person on FoxNews is saying

Poor Jim. Still having to unload your guilt over saying Trump would not get Mexico to pay for the wall.

You seem Jim, Trump said he’d get Mexico to pay for the wall. And when you said Trump wouldn’t get Mexico to pay for it, you inferred he would be a failure on that count.

To this point you still haven’t had the third grade aptitude to grasp that.

If you don’t like getting called on things, then don’t take a crap on the forum and expect folks to walk around it.

Yes, you constantly say you’re a great fan of Trump and support him.

Why is it that I run into your posts every few days that take Trump to task on one issue or another?

That’s why I didn’t walk around your crap on this thread.

It’s why I won’t walk around your crap on the next, when I see you do it again.

You poor thing. You just can’t grasp why some of us are sick of your and a few other folk’s crap.

You’ve had several years now to get on the Trump train. If you don’t want to climb on board, why don’t you go to D.U. and meet up with like minded people there.

None of us thought Mexico would cut us a check. It was understood by most of the adults on the forum, that there would have to be a work-around to get Mexico to pay for it.

Mexican nationals here send $30 billion dollars back to Mexico each year. Putting a 10% surcharge on those funds will more than pay for the wall.

If Mexican nationals pay for the wall, to me and most other folks, that’s Mexico paying for the wall. The point is you brainless dolt, the U.S. won’t be stuck with the bill.

If you were a Trump supporter as you love to claim, you’d figure that out on your own. I wouldn’t have to follow you around with a pooper scooper.

“The Mexico paying for the wall thing was a fun line for rallies, but did anyone really think that was true?”...

...”The BIG promise he is keeping is about protecting and strengthening America. God bless him for that.”

I’ll even go as far as saying that “The Wall” makes a good campaign line as well - but I’m pretty sure that Trump knew even as he was saying it that a wall couldn’t/wouldn’t be built along the entire border. But a sound bite line in a campaign speech can’t bring out the entire plan. BUT - it does get across the big idea - a protected border.

I was watching an old Nixon interview regarding the Constitution. He was asked about modern campaigns. He said that it is very difficult to get across the complete idea of something when you know that it will get cut to a 3 second TV soundbite. He had just given a 10+ minute long discussion of some intricate policy and referred back to that. To the effect of: “Now if I had a 30-second spot to talk about it - and 3 seconds of that was shown on the news - it would have been a disservice to that policy.”

2) In prior agreement with Gov. Abbot of TX, Saudis make $10b (or some fixed amount of that) into a direct grant to the STATE OF TEXAS for the sole purpose of building the wall, in accordance with Fed specs.
3) This money COULD NOT be touched or reduced by Congress.

****************************

Do you have a cite for that? That is great news, and would fit in well with their recent visit on working together to stop terrorism.

“Okay - you sell us a bunch of weapons to protect us from terrorists over here, and we’ll send you money so you can build a wall and protect yourself from terrorists over there.”

Although I’m not so sure I like the idea of other countries giving grant money like that. What if Iran wants to give a bunch of money to Detroit to build a bunch of radical mosques?

“Now if I had a 30-second spot to talk about it - and 3 seconds of that was shown on the news - it would have been a disservice to that policy.”
get across the big idea - a protected border

And that's the answer. You promise the big idea. You state your overall goal as Trump did, like promising "MAGA" with intended objectives like protecting the border, lowering taxes and regulations, and dealing decisively with ISIS and other threats to our nation. But you should avoid a specific, detailed promise like Mexico paying for the wall if you can't keep it, especially if you repeat the promise many times during the campaign and especially if you have no intention of keeping it (dunno Trump's intentions about payment - guess we'll see).

For specifics, you look for opportunities to engage in a 10+ minute long discussion of some intricate policy and refer back to that. In Trump's case, that would be Hannity, or possibly buying 30 minutes of time on TV, or publishing a policy paper as he did and putting it on the social media for easy access, and referring back to that. I see no need to promise with no ability and/or intention to deliver.

Electing a politician is like a contract in which your side of the contract is to vote for a political candidate who will have significant power over you. That kind of contract should not be taken lightly becaue your freedom and money are directly at risk. The political candidate's side of the contract are his promises to you. Nothing else. The promise of a political candidate is all he has to offer in exchange for your granting him such power at your expense. Therefore, such promises should not be taken lightly and any elected official should be be held accountable for his side of the bargain - fulfilling his promises.

IMO, "Making America Great Again" equates to nothing less than reinstating the Constitution as written and originally understood and intended as the supreme law of the land and restoring America as a free constitutional republic. I think Trump is the man of the hour in beginning this restoration. But America's restoration requires more than just the strategic logistics of legal, political, and military improvement. It also requires integrity in our elected officials.

Trump has done more than anyone has ever done in the WH in the first four months in beginning the process of restoring our free constitutional republic. He is generally fulfilling his promises and IMO has shown himself to generally be an honest man of integrity who can be trusted. As I said, I think he is God's man for this hour. God bless him. However, that does not preclude our duty to hold him accountable to continue to keep his promises, which I expect he will do, and hold him accountable when he does not. IMO, Reagan's words apply here: our job is to "Trust, but verify".

The importance of Trump's apparent failure to keep his repeated promise that Mexico would pay for the wall is not strategically important IMO. In fact, IMO, the wall itself is not essential in reasserting our sovereignty and preventing invasion of illegals and enemies. But I guess the wall would help during Leftist regimes I guess. The importance of breaking this promise is not that it fails to fulfill Trump's strategic promises but in not keeping a promise he made repeatedly and IMO unnecessarily during the campaign. It hurts his integrity IMO and to that extent it is important.

There’s so much. DACA is part of it. I have no reason to doubt that Trump will get rid of DACA. I wish Trump’s advisers would help him see that his EO to protect from unwanted immigration is actually a Constitutionally mandated act. “The United States shall...protect each [state] against invasion” (US Const, Art IV, Sec 4). (Illegal immigration and immigration of enemies like Islamist jihadists is invasion.)

As with other things, however, I think Trump has already started to go around the courts and stop this invasion anyway. What I hope he knows or will learn is he has every legal right to go around courts that unconstitutionally attempt to hinder his constitutional mandate to protect against invasion. It might have made life easier - at least harder for the Left to oppose, I think - if the referenced Constitutional clause had been referenced in his EO.

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