Trump's budget details billions in spending on the border wall

Trump's budget details billions in spending on the border wall

The fence at the US-Mexico border along the Rio Grande river in Brownsville, Texas, seen in 2014. REUTERS/Shannon Stapleton

Michelle Mark 

President Donald Trump laid out his plans for funding a wall along the US-Mexico border as part of the White House's budget blueprint released Thursday, detailing an initial payment for the wall's design and construction and plans for a hiring spree within immigration-enforcement agencies.

The budget proposal includes a $2.6 billion investment on "tactical infrastructure" and designs and planning for the wall as well as $314 million toward hiring and training 500 border-patrol agents and 1,000 Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers in 2018.

"This investment would strengthen border security, helping stem the flow of people and drugs illegally crossing the US borders," the proposal said.

The blueprint also proposes an additional $1.5 billion toward detaining and deporting unauthorized immigrants and $15 million for a mandatory national E-Verify system meant to cut down on unauthorized employment. The program would allow for businesses to determine whether new employees are eligible to work in the country.

Yet the budget proposal appears to fall short of early cost estimates for the wall's construction and maintenance, which could total as much as $21.6 billion, according to a Department of Homeland Security report last month. Trump himself previously cited a cost of $12 billion for the wall.

Mick Mulvaney, Trump's director of the Office of Management and Budget, told the news media on Wednesday that the White House could not yet estimate the total cost of the wall or how many miles it would cover.

Some GOP lawmakers have already expressed hesitation about the wall's funding, which Trump repeatedly promised on the campaign trail would be provided by Mexico.

"I don't care at all as long as Mexico's paying for it — it's neither here nor there for me," Republican Sen. Jeff Flake of Arizona told The Washington Post on Wednesday. "But if we're paying for it, it's a significant concern."

Mulvaney said the funding in the budget blueprint "provides for a couple of different pilot cases," but the White House hasn't determined what type of construction a wall would consist of or where construction would start. He told ABC News' "Good Morning America" on Thursday that the budget proposal helped fulfill Trump's campaign promises.

"We took his words and turned them into numbers," Mulvaney said. "The president promised a wall — he's going to deliver it."

http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-budget-billions-in-funding-for-mexico-border-wall-2017-3

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