President Trump will be seeking an additional $8.5 billion dollars for border wall construction on Monday when submits his 2020 budget request, according to Reuters.
The request eclipses the amount currently allocated for border projects as well as the number requested by the President in a contentious battle that closed the United States government for more than a month at the beginning of the year. It is also more than the president is attempting to gain by invoking a national emergency to fund the construction.
Trump had demanded $5.7 billion dollars for the wall in 2019, receiving only $1.375 billion for fencing and other needs. This led to Trump declaring a national emergency, reallocating $8.1 billion towards wall construction.
The national emergency declaration will likely be held up in court for some time, pushing the overall bill higher.
The amount also comes in below estimates for building or replacing some 722 miles of border wall, requested in 2017 by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP). At that time, the department was seeking $18 billion dollars.
Such a request is also unlikely to be met: his request will not likely make it through the Democrat-controlled House of Representatives.
The fight will likely be part of the backdrop for the 2020 presidential campaign, with President Trump already using “finish the wall” as a campaign slogan. The construction of a southern border wall was a key promise during his 2016 bid, although at the time he was claiming that our southern neighbor, Mexico, would pay for the barrier.
The president is also planning to seek more money for the Department of Homeland Security, Customs and Border Protection, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement, including more law enforcement officers and immigration judges. In exchange, the budget again seeks deep cuts to many non-defense programs.
The budget needs to be passed by October 1, and failure to do so would once against shutter the government.
Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license