That border wall won’t be a physical wall, says Sen. Lankford
“the president wants Congress to increase security along the border by ratcheting up patrols, surveillance and fencing”
That “big beautiful wall” won’t exactly be a wall at all, Sen. Lankford (R-OK) told The Hill Thursday.
Instead, the ‘border wall’ is more of a figurative statement for beefed-up border security. The Wall became a weighty bargaining chip in the DACA legalization negotiations with Trump demanding its construction in exchange for the codification of President Obama’s extra-legal DACA program, among other immigration program changes.
From The Hill:
President Trump on Thursday laid out his demands for an immigration deal to Republican senators, making clear he doesn’t expect Congress to build a physical 2,200-mile concrete wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
Instead, the president wants Congress to increase security along the border by ratcheting up patrols, surveillance and fencing, in return for relief for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program recipients in an immigration deal that could be tied to the 2018 spending bill.
“People want to paint that it’s some 2,000-mile long, 30-foot-high wall of concrete. That’s not what he means and not what he tries to say,” said Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.), who met with Trump at the White House Thursday.
“There’s going to be border fencing in some areas, there’s going to be vehicular barricades, there’s going to be technology, there’s going to be greater manpower in some areas,” he added.
Lankford said Trump has been clear “in private.”Government funding runs out on Jan. 19, and Congress has until March 5 to come up with a solution to protect “Dreamers” from deportation.
A similar deal tanked immigration negotiations in 2014. Republicans offered a sweet border enhancement package, honing in on the exact priorities recently outlined by Sen. Lankford, only to be scuttled by Democrats and the House Freedom Caucus.
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Comments
Noooooo, we want a wall where it can be built as future Administrations can’t be trusted !!!!
Agree 100% That wall Trump promised was without a doubt a physical object that he constantly described in physical terms. Maybe it was these kinds of shenanigans that got Bannon so fired up. Trump had a set of simple, strong campaign promises, and now the swamp is trying to swallow them up. Trump is surrounded by swampers, including his daughter and son-in-law, and they can’t tolerate anyone who insists that Trump must live up to his promises to earn the continued loyalty of his base.
Mr. Establishment lies. A LOT…!!!
Ragspeepee lies. A LOT…!!!
WHERE’S THE BEEF, DAMMIT! WHERE’S THAT DAMN BEEF!
This is the fastest way for President Trump to lose his base of supporters. They’ve already given up on getting rid of Obamacare and now this foolishness?
Is this #FakeNews, or WHAT?!
It’s not foolishness, it’s common sense. It’s not technically feasible to put a big physical wall through the couple hundred miles of the Big Bend area, for example. Believe me, I’ve been there. You would have to go maybe 100 miles inland, where the plains start above the canyons, and I don’t think we really want to wall off that big a chunk of this country. And except for the border towns like Nogales and a few others, most of the Arizona – New Mexico border is so barren that aerial surveillance with border guards on call is what is appropriate. (For most of that stretch there aren’t even any roads on the American side)
An actual physical wall is only practical from the Gulf up to a few dozen miles past Laredo, and across the southern border of California.
Well then, build that part now and the rest later….and send Mexico the bill!
In populated areas we need a physical wall, underground countermeasures, above ground drone swarms (80% surveillance, 20% antipersonnel, self directed gun turrets, and plentiful supply of body bags.
Rewarding illegal, regardless of their arguments, is a huge mistake. The first generation increases by at least 2.5.
A big part of the problem is the 14th amendment being used to to produce anchor babies and draw welfare. Why not repeal the 14th amendment, or maybe amend it to require one parent to be a citizen?
About 70 billion dollars is being sent back to Mexico each year, why not assess fees or a tax on those transfers, say 10-20%? Let those who are in America pay for the wall, and Mexico will thereby lose 7-14 billion each year, pays that price for allowing their people to swarm over our border.
We also need to enact punishments so severe for being here illegaly that they start leaving on their own. That is the best way to get rid of 10-20 million at low cost.
Hmmmmmm……
“….until March 5 to come up with a solution to protect “Dreamers” from deportation…
“A similar deal tanked immigration negotiations in 2014. Republicans offered a sweet border enhancement package, honing in on the exact priorities recently outlined by Sen. Lankford…
I would not trust Langford myself….
What “vested” interests does he have????????
“Oklahoma Sen. James Lankford is co-sponsoring legislation to protect DACA beneficiaries…Lankford has been an outspoken supporter of DACA beneficiaries…..
http://newsok.com/james-lankford-is-co-sponsoring-legislation-to-protect-daca-beneficiaries/article/5564125
Yep. Toldja…
I’ll believe President Trump over a serial liar.
Sounds like a Dem pipe-dream. The giveaway is—
in return for relief for Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program recipients in an immigration deal that could be tied to the 2018 spending bill.
This means the Dems are still fantasizing that they can use a threatened government shutdown to force the President to swallow their sabotage of his signature program. That’s just not a good handle on Trump. He’s not likely to panic just because some useless sections of the federal government might stop sucking up money for a while.
Constant and irreversible growth of government is important to career politicians—they probably can’t imagine a future without it. But the President isn’t a career politician.
Is it within Trump’s authority to cause federal employees not to be paid for any time they are off because of a government shutdown? If so, it would be fun to see the reaction if Trump stated before a shutdown that there will not be any pay for shutdown time off.
I would caution everyone to take anything said by a 3rd party as merely speculation, until Trump confirms it. Everyone in DC has an agenda and every one of them uses the media to attempt to push it.
Will DJT settle for “fencing” and increased patrols? I don’t know. I think that I’ll wait and see what happens here.
“Everyone in DC has an agenda and every one of them uses the media to attempt to push it.”
Including the Leaker-In-Chief.
Der Donald.
Thank you, Captain Obvious. Of course Trump has an agenda. Remember when Trump told everyone that the Congress was going to repeal Obamacare? Whether he actually believed that was possible or not, it was designed to put pressure on the Congress to do just that. It failed to work. However, trump repealed or modified all of the Obamacare regulations which he could affect unilaterally. So, did Trump lie? Was he simply over optimistic? Who knows. What is certain is that if you placed a large bet on Obamacare being repealed based upon Truimp’s statements, then you would have lost. The same is true with Langford’s statement.
No, Private Parts. If you bet on Langford being truthful, you’d WIN.
Opposite betting on Dondald Ducks.
This clairvoyant bulletin from the man who did not see the Trump election coming. Such an ability must have made you the richest man in the world. Got any hot stock tips for us?
“Got any hot stock tips for us?”
LOL, go with the opposite.
I never predicted the T-rump election, though I did cite to The Other McClain that after the the “Grab ’em” tape revealed his depravity, he was toast.
I was mistaken in believing that his supporters retained any vestige of integrity.
Good Lord, you still haven’t managed to grow up beyond middle school epithets. Donald Duck. Really? You want to go with that and imagine it doesn’t destroy whatever ridiculous point you’re tying to make, again and again, and again?
Where is the ignore button on this thing?
“I never predicted the T-rump election…”
Sure you did, you predicted he would lose, and worked hard to insure it. “Preference cascade” was your term used here.
Only Ragspeepee has integrity. What a joke.
I don’t get Rags at all. One of the things that drove me crazy back in ’07-’08 when Obama was running for president was his intense focus on how President Bush was wrong to go to war in Iraq. Personally, I agreed at the time, but what always got me was that Obama never had a solution or plan for the current state of affairs. Okay, sure, going into Iraq instead of getting bin Laden didn’t make much sense, but what do we do NOW?
He never addressed that, in large part because the thrill-up-their-leg media was so smitten with hype and change, but that really stuck with me. Okay, great, your keen 20/20 hindsight is the bomb. Um, so the heck what? What do we do NOW, in actual reality, in the present? Obama had no answers.
Rags never bothers with solutions or recognition of the current reality; he’s so stuck in mechanical toy mode: “but I said blah blah blah about how much T-rump sucks. So there!” It’s useless and does nothing but piss everyone off; Trump is president. Who gives a poo what anyone thought or did prior to that fact? (Hint to Rags, the answer is: no one with a brain that isn’t stuck on stupid).
It’s wearying. Endless loops of “see!” with zero input about how to proceed from this point, the point in time at which we all actually exist and from which we can affect change. Instead, we just get Rags reliving the past with zero input for the present (much less the future). Rags hates Trump, blah blah blah. Rags thinks Trump sucks, yawn. What does he propose we do from here? Why, whine and whinge and cry and melt, of course. Oh, and toss in the occasional foot stomp for good measure.
Yawn.
Rags bores me these days.
In other words, open borders.
At the White House press briefing today the phrase “physical wall” was used.
Hate to say it but that wall we all thought we were being promised is going to turnout to be just a bunch of promises and platitudes.
What is even worse is going to have to watch the hardcore Trump defenders SPIN this as being exactly what he meant, that those who expected an actual wall were just topo stupid to understand his meaning. Some will use the excuse that land owners don’t want to give up the land – well shouldn’t Trump have thought of that when he made his promise?
And even worse I worry that the “beefed up security” drivel we are going to be sold will be what we get in return for DACA amnesty. And the hardcore supporters will excuse Trump for that because “Congress did it.”
IF no physical wall is built, it will be because the CONGRESS will not fund it. Building a physical barrier has been part of the budget for the last ten years and it was never done, because the Congress did not allocate funds for it. Even if they had, it is unlikely that Bush or Obama would have built it.
What people are beginning to realize is that Trump is not a dictator who controls the government. He is a CEO who can only do what his board of directors, the Congress, allows him to do and which it funds.
We will have to see exactly what is done, with regard to building a physical barrier along the Southern Border, and what form that barrier will take. We might be pleasantly surprised.
…or NOT.
I’ve predicted this for about two years now.
Donald Ducks lies. A LOT…!!!
Oh, yeah? LOL.
Ragspeepee lies. A LOT…!!!
Nearly every thing you’ve predicted has been wrong. Mostly just your putrid deranged lies.
Most recently, you (you lying SOS), predicted that Moore would would by at least 10 points.
I predicted he was toast.
You lie constantly, and you’re insane.
“Most recently, you (you lying SOS), predicted that Moore would would by at least 10 points.”
I didn’t predict he “would would” Anything. Nor did I predict he would win “by at least 10 points”.
As I recall, I did predict he would win by 10, plus or minus a few. That turned out to be wrong, a mistake. Some of us know the difference in a lie and a mistake. No lie just because you are wrong.
You did predict it correctly.
The mentally ill always think everyone else is insane. Fits you rather well.
Barry, if you keep using logic and being sane and normal, Rags will call you “evil.”
But wait, that’s your plan, right? Get under Rag’s skin by saying what you think (Rags finds the expression of one’s own ideas particularly offensive) and then swooping in to steal my title as most evilest evil person to be evil on this earth.
I see your tricks and magic, Barry! 😉
Well, we could mount lasers instead, and they could shoot down drones and aircraft as well…
We know that the Left and the GOPe want to destroy the country. We know that there is no rule of law. They are working real hard to convince the country that voting makes no difference because no matter who wins, the Left and the GOPe will still screw it over.
The variable is how long people will put up with government NOT with the consent of the governed. In fact without even the pretense of such consent.
They will do what they will do. The country will do what it will do. Sides are now, and will continue to be chosen. At some point the choices made will be irrevocable.
If the ‘wall issue’ is phony, why do (D) fight it so hard.
They could simply agree, get their DACA approval and cal it a win-win.
The fact that the (D-GOPe) won’t agree to it indicates that it really matters – what do others here at LI think about that ?
Rags has been reduced to liking his own posts. I look forward to the coming year listening to him whine every thread. What a sore loser.
Lankford is an Amnesty RINO.
His words are meaningless.
What Trump said, to the cameras, when Senate R’s came to the WH is the actual agenda.
And, yes, it included a “big beautiful WALL”.
So Langford is just the Red-Headed Obama.
I already know he comes from that Leftist, Progressive, Democrat Swamp known as OKC…. ‘Nuff Said!
To hell with this RINO POS Lankford. First off, he’s a known and proven liar, and second PDT has been quite clear about a wall.
An “e-verify” wall for employers SHOULD be a first step, making it virtually impossible to hire an illegal alien. A second measure, extreme welfare reform, should also be implemented to discourage the “anchor baby” practice.
“e-verify” was originally party of the amnesty deal under President Reagen, but as usual, the Democrats lied and reneged on the deal.
Good. A physical wall has always been a white elephant of any marginal utility, and the price of the thing absolutely begs better solutions to border security than a physical.
All those jokes about 30′ walls generating sales of 40′ ladders are not actually jokes. That kind of thing will happen. A wall needs to be patrolled regularly against that – and if there are going to be regular patrols, why do we need the wall?
Bear in mind that even with watchtowers, floodlights, guard dogs, and shoot-to-kill orders, the East Germans never totally secured their wall. And thankfully, I’ve never seen any of those fun little accouterments in any of the wall planning.
Good points – the Romans, who built a lot of walls, knew that they had to keep small garrisons every mile (roughly) and major garrisons (forts) every 10 miles or so, to service the smaller garrisons. That’s how they controlled Hadrian’s wall, and the Great Wall of China used a similar setup.
As soon as the soldiers left, the walls become useless. Same for any future wall. No one figures this into the cost – a wall will do nothing unless you budget for and create at least a 50,000 man force to guard it.
I’d argue that the Roman Empire’s border walls along the Rhine and Danube became of little use long before the Empire collapsed, as invaders improved their organization and began invading in sufficiently large groups to overwhelm the border defenses.
For it was a long border, and the Empire’s resources were limited.
Then again, our technology is ‘way better than that 3rd, 4th, 5th century stuff.
Even so, whenever a prize is sufficiently attractive people will find a way to obtain it. Thus, enforcement of e-verify and welfare reform have more potential than even the fanciest and costliest of walls, as they work by reducing incentives.
Although it’s certainly true that a wall may as well not be there if the will to prevent its unauthorized crossing is absent.
In later years, the Roman Empire mostly adopted a “defense in depth” strategy, keeping its heavy forces as much as 50 miles behind the border. And this sort of worked for many years, but at the cost of leaving areas near the border uninhabitable.
Until the later, later years, when these border areas became uninhabitable- for Roman citizens, but not for the invaders who had occupied them.
Then again, the USA is not a latter-day Roman Empire.
Take your logic and apply it to the the security fencing around the White House or the walls that surround most compounds of the Rich and Famous.
Do you see many 40 foot ladders in those instances? I don’t. Why do you think that is?
Because there is an armed security force with full time video surveillance of all sectors of the barrier, ready, willing, and able to respond to any penetration. (definitely for the white house, and also for any high end houses that want to actually be secure) THAT is the actual deterrent.
But we’ve had that deterrent at the border for decades to no avail. They can’t be everywhere all the time. A physical barrier wall (or fence as is in the case of the White House) is what makes all that armed security and video surveillance work. You cannot have one without the other and effectively control the perimeter, as history has proven.
As for the 40 foot ladder joke – it’s like arguing your front door is useless because lockpicks exist. Do you still lock your front door? Why?
Nope, we are getting a physical barrier wall. Built with McCain and Lankford as mortar if necessary.
No wall, no Trump 2020. Guaranteed.
It’s the economy, stupid. A wall would be nice but if the economy is roaring and Trump is not the reason for the wall not being built, Trump will prevail.