Trump walks out of border wall meeting with Dems, calls it ‘waste of time’
President Donald Trump abruptly walked out of a closed-door meeting with congressional leaders Wednesday in the White House Situation Room after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer rejected his plea to include the $5.7 funding for his wall in the next government spending bill in exchange for ending a weeks-long government shutdown.
“Just left a meeting with Chuck and Nancy, a total waste of time. I asked what is going to happen in 30 days if I quickly open things up, are you going to approve Border Security which includes a Wall or Steel Barrier? Nancy said, NO. I said bye-bye, nothing else works!,” he wrote in a tweet.
Just left a meeting with Chuck and Nancy, a total waste of time. I asked what is going to happen in 30 days if I quickly open things up, are you going to approve Border Security which includes a Wall or Steel Barrier? Nancy said, NO. I said bye-bye, nothing else works!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 9, 2019
After the meeting, Schumer confirmed to reporters that Trump had indeed “just got up and walked out.”
“He asked Speaker Pelosi, ‘will you agree to my wall?’ She said no. And he just got up, and said, ‘Well we’ve got nothing to discuss,'” the New York senator added. “Again, we saw a temper tantrum because he couldn’t get his way.”
Schumer also claimed that Trump had slammed his hand on a table in frustration but Vice President Mike Pence and other Republicans present at the meeting denied that happened.
Calling Trump “petulant,” Pelosi accused the president of being “insensitive” to the fact that by refusing to reopen the government thousands of federal government employees remained either unpaid or furloughed.
“The president seems to be insensitive to that,” she said. “He thinks maybe they could just ask their father for more money. But they can’t,” she said, taking a subtle jab at Trump’s wealthy upbringing.
The shutdown over Trump’s border wall began on December 22 and has already become the second longest in US history. The longest ever shutdown in US history took place in December 1995 and January 1996 and lasted 21 days under former President Bill Clinton.
Trump’s decision to partially close federal agencies affects nearly 800,000 workers, whom Pelosi said were “collateral damage” to Trump.
