Trump mocks ‘the resistance’ at RNC winter meeting

President Trump mocked Democrats and “the resistance” at the Republican National Committee’s (RNC) winter meeting at the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., on Thursday night.

In brief remarks broadcast by Fox News, Trump said that his administration has been able to pass major legislation, including an overhaul of the tax code, despite Democrats’ call to “resist” his presidency.

“You know, the name is resist,” Trump joked. “That’s the name of their movement. ‘Resist.’ That’s all they do is resist. I don’t know if they’re good at it, they can’t be too good at it because we’re passing a lot of things.”

“So I wouldn’t say their resistance is extremely successful,” he added.

{mosads}

Trump made the remarks after speculating that congressional Democrats would be unwilling to work with his administration on a fix for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) recipients, accusing the party of just wanting to “talk” about immigration reform.

“You know, the Democrats are AWOL. They’re missing in action,” the president said. “We’re saying, ‘where are they? We have a proposal, we never hear from them.’ Because I don’t think they want to solve the DACA problem. I think they want to talk about it. I think they want to obstruct.”

Trump’s comments came during a brief portion of the event that was open to the press before members of the media said reporters were escorted out of the room.

Press only allowed to cover a few minutes of his remarks to the RNC, before being escorted out of the room.

— Mark Knoller (@markknoller) February 1, 2018

After five minutes of covering President Trump’s remarks to the Republican National Committee, the press pool has been kicked out of the Trump International Hotel.

— Gregory Korte (@gregorykorte) February 1, 2018 

Last week, the White House said Trump would endorse a plan allowing as many as 1.8 million young immigrants to seek U.S. citizenship in exchange for funding for a border wall system and and other sweeping changes to the U.S. immigration system.

Trump accused Democrats of “doing nothing” on DACA in a tweet earlier Thursday as lawmakers push to secure a deal to protect an estimated 700,000 young immigrants at risk of deportation ahead of a March deadline that Trump announced when saying he would rescind the Obama-era immigration program.

“March 5th is rapidly approaching and the Democrats are doing nothing about DACA. They Resist, Blame, Complain and Obstruct – and do nothing,” Trump said.

“Start pushing Nancy Pelosi and the Dems to work out a DACA fix, NOW!”