President Trump on Sunday sought to pin blame on Democrats for what lawmakers described as faltering negotiations on border security funding.
“I don’t think the Dems on the Border Committee are being allowed by their leaders to make a deal,” Trump tweeted. “They are offering very little money for the desperately needed Border Wall & now, out of the blue, want a cap on convicted violent felons to be held in detention!”
In a follow-up tweet, Trump suggested that Democrats “want a Shutdown” to change the subject from a week of difficult headlines. He referenced his State of the Union address, which received largely positive marks in polls, and the ongoing scandals that have engulfed the top three elected Democrats in Virginia.
{mosads}No Democrat in Congress has publicly said they support shutting down the government, though acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he could not rule out the possibility of another shutdown over Trump’s border security demands.
Trump triggered a recent 35-day government shutdown with his demand for $5.7 billion for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Democrats have offered funding for other border security measures, but no money for the wall.
The president agreed to reopen the government until Feb. 15 while a bipartisan group of lawmakers negotiates a deal to fund border security.
Some members of the group expressed optimism a deal could be reached by Monday with both parties voicing a desire to compromise, but negotiations appeared to have stalled as both sides remain dug in.
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) said Sunday that Democrats have pushed to cap the number of immigrants who can be detained by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), presenting a new obstacle for negotiators.
Trump referenced that particular sticking point in a tweet later Sunday afternoon, when he accused Democrats of behaving “irrationally” and equated their desire to cap detentions with refusing to take murderers into custody. Immigrant detention centers are not used solely to house violent criminals.
The standoff raises the specter of another partial shutdown, or of Trump declaring a national emergency to secure wall funding. The latter move would likely prompt legal challenges.
Mulvaney invited a host of lawmakers to Camp David over the weekend, though not all of the attendees were on the bipartisan committee tasked with appropriating money for border security.
“If [Rep. Tom Graves (R-Ga.)] and I and the group that was up at Camp David, including Mick Mulvaney, were left to our own devices, we would’ve solved it in less than a day,” Rep. John Yarmuth (D-Ky.) said on “This Week” earlier Sunday. “And if Mick Mulvaney were president we could’ve solved it.”
Updated at 5:30 p.m.