President Donald Trump remains lost in a paranoid, racist wonderland of his own making, and he also keeps dragging the United States along with him down that dark path. This Friday while speaking to reporters in the Rose Garden, he threatened to declare a state of emergency in order to have the freedom to use his executive authority to construct the border wall blocking off Mexico he’s long sought.
ABC reporter Terry Moran asked him, seeking apparent confirmation of previous behind the scenes reporting:
‘Have you considered using emergency powers to grant yourself authority to build this wall without Congressional approval?’
Trump jumped right into replying:
‘We can call a national emergency because of the security of our country. I haven’t done it. I may do it. I may do it, but we can call a national emergency and build it very quickly, and that’s another way of doing it, but if we can do it through a negotiated process, we’re giving that a shot.’
Moran asked him if that should be considered a threat against Democrats hanging over the ongoing negotiation process, but Trump shot back:
‘I never threaten anybody, but I am allowed to do it.’
Watch below.
WATCH: President Trump says he is considering declaring a national emergency as a potential attempt to circumvent Congress for border wall funding. pic.twitter.com/7CYDuBS2pn
— NBC News (@NBCNews) January 4, 2019
Trump was speaking to reporters after meeting with Congressional Democratic leaders at the White House to deal with the ongoing partial federal government shutdown.
Trump has refused to approve any funding at all if he doesn’t get what he wants for his border wall, and as the days and weeks of the shutdown have dragged on, he’s only dug further into his position. This Friday, after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) claimed as much, Trump confirmed that he feels willing to let the government remain shutdown for months or years if he doesn’t get what he wants for his wall.
He has dismissed concerns about the hundreds of thousands of federal workers left out in the cold by the shutdown, some of which were sent home while others are expected to work without pay. This week, he claimed without evidence yet again that the workers would say his efforts to get a border wall are more important than their paychecks.
That doesn’t even cover the absurdity of his proposal to push for the wall so passionately that he declares a national emergency in the first place.
The facts haven’t changed that undocumented border crossings are down overall, and no large numbers of terrorists are apprehended at the southern border as the Trump administration has claimed.
Still, CNN shares that internal Trump administration discussions have proceeded on the possibility that the president direct $1-2 billion in military funding to be used for a border wall — which despite Trump’s repeated claims otherwise, has not yet been built in any capacity. Steel fences and open space don’t magically become walls because Trump says so.
Still, Trump continues on with his mission to turn the United States and world into his personal wannabe dictatorship — while Democrats, whose support is needed in some capacity to get the federal government reopen, have insisted that the concept of a border wall is a “non-starter” for funding negotiations.
Featured Image via Screenshot from the video
