White House counselor Kellyanne Conway on Wednesday said that President Trump would “take a look” at a short-term funding measure to keep the government open, but insisted that the administration was not backing off its demands for funding for a wall along the southern border.
“He’ll take a look at that certainly,” Conway told reporters outside the White House when asked about whether Trump would approve of a stopgap continuing resolution (CR).
{mosads}”This is all breaking news, in other words, what the Congress is going to put before him,” she added. “A short-term CR or a CR that goes through Feb. 8 keeps the government up and running, but that doesn’t mean the president is backing down from an essential promise, not a campaign promise, a promise as president of the United States and our commander in chief to keep us safe.”
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Wednesday said that he will move a stopgap measure funding the government until early February. Funding for roughly a quarter of the government is set to expire on Friday.
As the White House seemed prepared to cede its funding demands in this round of negotiations, Conway insisted that the White House would get its desired money for border security “one way or another.”
“The president has been asking the relevant agencies and principles, is there money for, not the wall, for border security,” she said. “And he has said one way or another he’ll get that money. And he’s asking the question government-wide.”
The White House has, over the last 24 hours, appeared amenable to backing off its demand for $5 billion in funding for a border wall in order to avert a partial government shutdown.
White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told Fox News that the administration has “other ways” to get the $5 billion and that it does not “want to shut down the government.” She later said Trump has asked Cabinet agencies to find additional funds that could be used to build the wall, which has been a cornerstone of Trump’s immigration policy since he first ran for president.
Trump said on Twitter on Wednesday morning that Mexico would “indirectly” pay for the border wall with funds from the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement, which would replace the North American Free Trade Agreement. However, the agreement has not yet been ratified by Congress, and experts have questioned how much additional revenue the agreement would create and whether it could be appropriated to wall funding.