Trump: Mexico – No, Wait – the Military Will Pay for the Wall!

There is no joke left for me to make on this topic. We all knew this was coming. Mexico was never going to pay for the wall. The Washington Post proclaimed that President Trump is “privately pressing” Paul Ryan to pin provisions for his proposed partition protruding from pier to pier to the Pentagon’s planned disbursement. All that’s remaining is the utter hilarity that is our shared reality. Per WaPo:

Trump, who told advisers he was spurned in a large spending bill last week when lawmakers only appropriated $1.6 billion for the border wall, has begun suggesting the Pentagon could fund the sprawling construction, citing a “national security” risk.

After floating the notion to several advisers last week, he told Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) that the military should pay for the wall in a meeting last Wednesday in the White House residence, according to three people familiar with the meeting. Ryan offered little reaction to the notion, these people said, but senior Capitol Hill officials later said it was an unlikely prospect.

President Mad Online implored us over the weekend that the $1.6 billion (which fell well short of the $25 billion he requested) for his wall is simply a down-payment.

Much can be done with the $1.6 Billion given to building and fixing the border wall. It is just a down payment. Work will start immediately. The rest of the money will come – and remember DACA, the Democrats abandoned you (but we will not)!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 25, 2018

However, because this man is cable news and cable news is this man, the negative headlines over his famed wall are getting to POTUShitforbrains. Per WaPo:

Trump has grown frustrated watching constant TV criticism of the spending deal he signed last week and is determined to find a new way to fund the wall, several advisers said, privately grousing that his political supporters could become disenchanted without progress. After a recent trip to see prototypes of the wall in California, Trump has grown more animated by the issue, advisers said.

Trump is essentially trying to trade the wall for funding DACA—a stark reminder of how he and Republicans view immigration—and the Democrats are balking at the offer. Politically, it’s probably a smart move by the Dems because there is very little enthusiasm amongst Republicans to spend $25 billion on a wall that won’t do anything to stop drugs from flowing into our country. Morally, they’re hanging the DACA kids out to dry as political pawns. Politics is awful.

Luckily, much of Trump’s anxiety is likely fueled by the impeding ass-kicking the Republican Party expects to receive in the 2018 midterms (he supposedly does not think it will be as bad as many GOP flacks are predicting). This list of GOP sins is too long for one column, and would require volumes of books, but Trump’s election sure seems to have awakened a fire within a more diverse and tolerant slice of America than is served by this corporatist white nationalist party. His titanic incompetence and fraudulence are daily reminders of why the Republican Party cannot be trusted with power, and must be voted out of office in every nook and cranny of this country come November.

Jacob Weindling is a staff writer for Paste politics. Follow him on Twitter at @Jakeweindling.