Washington: US President Donald Trump threatened to declare a national emergency in order to build a US-Mexico border wall without the approval of Congress.
However, some view the President’s latest threat as simply another attempt to gain the upper hand in negotiations with the Democrats. This may not be a threat, more a bluff.
The threat came after he met senior Democrats. They refused his demand for funding the border wall. The stand-off with the Demorats saw Mr Trump withhold support for a Bill to fully fund the government until he got money for the border wall.
The President said he was prepared for the partial government shutdown — now in its third week — to last years. Around 800,000 federal workers went without pay since December 22. Trump’s aides and lawmakers will meet later on on Saturday in a fresh bid to resolve the impasse. The Republican President initially gave a positive account of the 90-minute meeting at the White House, describing it as “very productive”.
However, when asked whether he had considered using emergency presidential powers to bypass congressional approval of funding, Mr Trump said he had.
“I may do it. We can call a national emergency and build it very quickly. That’s another way of doing it.”
“I’m very proud of doing what I’m doing,” the President added. “I don’t call it a shutdown, I call it doing what you have to do for the benefit and safety of our country.”
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Friday’s meeting had been “contentious”, while Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said: “We told the President we needed the government open. He resisted.”
Donald Trump said he can declare a “national emergency” and build his promised wall along the border without Congressional approval. If that’s the case, the question becomes why he doesn't go ahead and do that. Why put federal workers through the pain of forgoing pay and hamstring key government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, if he could bypass Demo-cratic objections with the snap of his presidential fingers? The answer is because the solution isn’t that simple. There are provisions of US law that allow the President to direct military construction projects during war or national emergency, but that money would have to come from Defence Department funds allocated by Congress for other purposes. Such a move may prompt Congr-ess, including Republi-cans, to push back.
Then there’s the inevitable legal challenge from Democrats to such an exercise of presidential authority. Any presidential order to build a wall would be met by an equally imposing wall of court filings blocking its construction.
Democrats, who now hold the majority in the House, passed spending Bills on Thursday to reopen the government, including $1.3bn (£1bn) of border security funds until February 8.
But the legislation cannot take effect unless it passes the Republican-controlled Senate, where leader Mitch McConnell said his party would not back any measure without the President’s support.
The Kentucky senator called the Democratic budget “a time-wasting act of political posturing”.
In Friday’s news conference, Mr Trump also told reporters he might consider asking his cabinet to decline a $10,000 raise that is due to take effect because a pay freeze has expired as an inadvertent result of the shutdown.
The fiscal fiasco began when Congress and Mr Trump failed to reach an agreement over a budget Bill in December.
The Republicans had passed an initial funding bill including $5bn for the wall, when they still had a majority in the House, but they could not get the necessary 60 votes in the 100-seat Senate. Two vulnerable Republican senators up for re-election in 2020 — Cory Gardner of Colorado and Susan Collins of Maine — broke ranks to back approving the budget and ending the shutdown.
The White House is again floating the idea of a deal for “Dreamers” - immigrants who illegally entered the US as children.
Democrats want to ensure that these individuals are shielded from deportation.
