The deal key lawmakers agreed on "in principle" Monday night doesn't have the $5.7 billion in border wall funding Donald Trump demanded—instead it includes $1.375 billion for building new barriers, including fencing, along the border. The White House didn't immediately comment after lawmakers announced their breakthrough in negotiations, however long it lasts. But if Trump agrees to sign on to the plan, the looming government shutdown will be averted.
GOP Senate Appropriations Committee chair, Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby, said "the fact that it looked like there was going to be another shutdown" helped reboot the talks after they had faltered over the weekend. But Shelby couldn't say if Trump would agree to the compromise, which fails to provide the wall money Trump wanted but also scrapped the Democrats' desire to cap the number of detention beds available for undocumented immigrants arrested by ICE inside the U.S. Instead, negotiators agreed to revert back to levels set by a previous budget on the number of total detention beds for both migrants and undocumented immigrants, 40,520 beds. That represents “a decrease of about 17 percent from current levels,” according to the New York Times.
“We think so. We hope so," Sen. Shelby said, attempting to predict whether Trump would support the plan, which would fund the government through September. As their congressional colleagues review the deal, appropriators said they hoped to have a final product by Wednesday.
“Some may be happy, some may not be happy,” said New York Rep. Nita Lowey, Democratic chair of the House Appropriations Committee. “We did the best we could.”
Let’s keep in mind that under normal circumstances, lawmakers would have had reasonable parameters, driven by the White House, that they knew would be acceptable to the president. Instead, they have no idea how the deal will be received in the West Wing because Trump is just that pathetic at his job.