far-right contingent over the truth, over compromise, and certainly over the families like the one you met tonight. they re bearing the burden of this shutdown that he started. be clear. he is not redefining his idea of the wall to compromise. this slide from, well, it won t be concrete. it will be steel. and we won t call it a wall. call it whatever they want just so we can get it done. no, no, no. this isn t him compromising. this is him knowing what he s talking about now, and he s adjusting his ruse to the reality. show these guys the wall that he s pretending now that he created and started, this bollard fencing. you remember i was down there on the border standing in front of it. they have been doing this since the last administration. it s not this president s idea. it s not his idea. it s not his design. it s not new. he s hoping you ll see it as that, but he s playing you for a sucker. he s also selling you on a consensus that doesn t exist. most americans want the wall.
of you want his wall. and he is choosing that far right contingent over the truth, over compromise, and certainly over the families like the one you met tonight. they re bearing the burden of this shutdown that he started. be clear. he is not redefining his idea of the wall to compromise. this slide from, well, it won t be concrete. it will be steel. and we won t call it a wall. call it whatever they want just so we can get it done. no, no, no. this isn t him compromising. this is him knowing what he s talking about now, and he s adjusting his ruse to the reality. show these guys the wall that he s pretending now that he created and started, this bollard fencing. you remember i was down there on the border standing in front of it. they have been doing this since the last administration. it s not this president s idea. it s not his idea. it s not his design. it s not new. he s hoping you ll see it as that, but he s playing you for a sucker.
he s also selling you on a consensus that doesn t exist. most americans want the wall. show me. i haven t seen it. and he says every other president wanted to build a wall too, and they told him that. listen. this should have been done by all of the presidents that preceded me, and they all know it. some of them have told me that we should have done it. who? ex-presidents carter, clinton, w., george w. bush, and obama. the truth is, none of them spoke with the president about it. that s what they say. so don t be a sucker, and don t fall for a farce. but also be aware of an important fact. do the people who keep us safe want more bollard fencing, those big steel barriers? yes, they do. do they believe we ll be safer if they have them? yes. but they have never told me it s a panacea, not even close. they need other types of technology for different areas, manpower for different areas, money for places to keep kids and families, for judges, for case workers. now, i know the white hou
saying, yes, there is funding that have been used for these border barriers but it isn t the wall the president promised, in fact, specifically cited it can t be for the wall as he promised it. but i do understand what you re saying. john, to that point, what the president said after the campaign is customs and border patrol career officers came and said, here s the wall that we want. here is the fencing that we want. that s the plan the administration submitted to congress to get funding that congress has funded. so, in fact, that is the white house proposal. that is what is actually congress supporting. i understand democrats are in a tough spot because they want to say to their base, we never agreed to that, but they twi actually did. again, look, mark, i understand that wasn t the promise, that wasn t who s going to build the wall, who s going to pay for it? mexico. it s neither of the things he promised during the campaign. yes, that was the deal that was struck more than a ye
doesn t quite have the same ring, does it? it s kind of like the difference between lock her up and community service. with me now, usa today columnist and cnn political analyst kirsten powers and former trump white house director of legislative affairs and cnn political commentator mark short. mark, democrats are taking over the house a couple weeks from now so the way you look at this now, for all intents and purposes, was this the president s last best chance to get funding for his wall? i think it is one of the last opportunities to get funding for the wall, john, but i do think where the administration should be focused, frankly, is to say accurately that last year they got the first new funding in ten years at $1.6 billion. i ve heard the democrat talking points and some echoed on this network that say it s not wall. it s actually $5 million of a levee system, 20-foot concrete wall with a road in between and another wall on the other side. it s $200 million of actual new fe