President Trump said Wednesday he will not sign an immigration deal that does not include funding for a border wall.
“We need the wall for security, we need the wall for safety, we need the wall for stopping the drugs from pouring in.”
Trump sought to clarify comments he made Wednesday, when he told lawmakers he would sign just about any immigration deal they put on his desk.
The president also signaled that he believes lawmakers on both sides of the aisle can work on a bipartisan solution to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program. Trump met with a bipartisan group of more than 20 lawmakers on Tuesday about finding a legal fix to the Obama-era program. {mosads}
The talks come amid a federal judge’s decision to temporarily block Trump’s ending of DACA, which the White House called “outrageous.”
“I would imagine that the people in the room, both Democrat and Republican, I really believe they’re going to come up with a solution to the DACA problem, which has been going on for a long time,” Trump said at Wednesday’s press conference.
“And maybe beyond that immigration as a whole, but any solution has to include the wall because, without the wall, it all doesn’t work.”
The debate over DACA also comes as lawmakers are rushing to meet the quickly approaching deadline to fund the government through September. Democrats are under pressure to make a DACA fix part of the spending bill, while Republican leaders want it to instead be a stand-alone package.