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Trump Presses Demand for Wall Along US-Mexico Border

by Ken Bredemeier

   U.S. President Donald Trump pressed Congress again Monday to approve
   the controversial construction of a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border
   to thwart illegal immigration.

   "Border security is national security," the U.S. leader told a White
   House news conference after meeting with Italian Prime Minister
   Giuseppe Conte, another Western leader who has adopted a hard-line
   immigration posture. "Strong nations must have strong borders."

   Trump called the U.S. "the laughingstock of the world, with the worst
   immigration laws anywhere in the world."

   Trump, expanding on the immigration comments he posted on Twitter the
   day before, said he would have "no problem doing a shutdown" of U.S.
   government operations at the end of September when current funding
   expires if he does not win approval for the wall, a key pledge of his
   during the 2016 presidential campaign.

   But when asked whether he wants approval of full $25 billion funding
   for the wall, as well as other tougher immigration changes he has
   demanded in order to avert a shutdown, he replied, "I always leave room
   for negotiation."

   In addition to the wall, Trump has called for the end to a visa lottery
   allowing migrants from overseas to move to the U.S. Instead, he wants a
   "merit" system in which job skills and education of the migrants play
   an important role in whether they are allowed into the country.

   "We have laws that don't work," Trump said. "We have to end these
   horrible 'catch and release' principles where you catch somebody, you
   take their name and you release them. You don't even know who they are.
   The whole thing is ridiculous."

   Trump praised Conte for demanding that other European countries share
   the responsibility for handling the thousands of migrants who have
   descended on Italian shores as they escaped Africa and headed across
   the Mediterranean Sea to Europe.

   Trump's bid for funding a border wall in late September is uncertain.

   In recent weeks, the House of Representatives already defeated two
   immigration proposals Trump supported. Any new action in late September
   would seem unlikely, coming about five weeks before nationwide
   congressional elections, a time when most lawmakers are unwilling to
   debate and vote on controversial issues like immigration.