Trump: Democrats ‘just aren’t calling’ on DACA
President Trump took to Twitter on Thursday night to slam Democratic leaders for “not calling” him about a fix for the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.
“The Democrats just aren’t calling about DACA. Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Schumer have to get moving fast, or they’ll disappoint you again,” Trump wrote, referring to the House Democratic leader and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.). “We have a great chance to make a deal or, blame the Dems! March 5th is coming up fast.”
Trump tweeted a similar sentiment early Thursday when he said Democrats were “doing nothing” to protect young immigrants covered by DACA.
Trump announced in September that he would move to end the program, which protects certain young immigrants who were brought into the U.S. illegally when they were children from being deported, unless Congress could come up with a fix by March.
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A bipartisan group of senators led by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) and Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said last month they had reached a deal among themselves for a immigration package that provided a fix for DACA as well as provided border security funding and changes to legal immigration. Trump later rejected that plan.
Schumer later tried to negotiate a deal with Trump to pair a DACA fix with funding for a border wall, but those negotiations failed.
Republicans and Democrats could not agree on a government spending bill last month because a fix for DACA wasn’t included, leading to a three-day government shutdown.
The White House unveiled details of Trump’s immigration plan last week. The plan includes a path to citizenship for 1.8 million immigrants, including those who are covered by DACA program as well as those who are eligible for DACA but did not apply.
In exchange for those protections, Trump will seek $25 billion in funding for his wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. The money would be placed in a trust fund, preventing it from being reallocated by future Congresses.