Sen. Lindsey Graham said that after speaking with President Trump this weekend, it’s clear Mr. Trump is holding firm in his demands for border wall money as part of a deal to end a partial government shutdown.
“It was pretty clear to me that we’re never going to have a deal unless we get a wall as part of it,” Mr. Graham, South Carolina Republican, said Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”
Mr. Graham said Republicans are stuck negotiating with people who want to “abolish” Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and who accuse anyone who supports a wall as being racist.
“As long as the radical left is in charge, we’re never going to get anywhere,” he said.
He derided House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s recent comment that she’d be willing to give Mr. Trump “one dollar” for the wall as part of a deal.
Government workers going without pay are “being held hostage by people who say you need one dollar to secure the border,” he said.
“I do want to open up the government, but the goal is not to open up the government — the goal is to fix a broken immigration system, to bring reality to this table that ICE is not the problem — it’s the solution,” he said.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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