Free Republic

Over a month into the longest partial government shutdown in history, President Trump remains determined to make good on his promise to build a border wall to protect U.S. national security, while the Democrats remain staunchly opposed. President Trump has the opportunity to bypass Democrat opposition by drawing on unobligated balances to fund the border wall, effectively precluding a national emergency declaration and allowing for the government to reopen.

President Donald Trump just blindsided Congress and found all the border wall money that he needs — and billions more. In a column from The American Thinker, conservative author Rovvy Lepor reveals that Congress has over one trillion dollars sitting in what he calls “unobligated balances.”[snip] It would not only fully fund the entire wall, but it also appears that there’s nothing Democrats could do to stop Trump. On top of that, a president using the unobligated funds to finance a project is hardly unprecedented, as detailed by Lepor in the piece above.