deal maker in the case. that's not us saying it. here is what chris stewart told cnn's jim sciutto today. he said, and i'm quoting, the deal we ended up with now is worse than before the shutdown. point in fact, the president's record in the private sector is littered with ill-fated deals. when we asked biographer dantonio how the latest episode compares, he said, and i'm quoting, the president may have just found a new way to lose, which may explain why he was scrambling to put the best possible face on it first by pointing to another bigger, better number than the one we've all been focused on. >> and we have a lot of options and a lot of things are happening, very positive things. you know, the numbers are almost $23 billion, which you don't report too often. it's about an 8% increase over last year. so if you look at the total funding, it's over -- almost up to $23 billion, 8% higher. >> that's not just for a wall t.