$25 billion border wall deal in exchange for daca. then he shuts down the government for 35 days in a reckless fashion and then says uncle at the end and engages in an unconditional surrender when he could have gotten at least $1.6 billion, as you pointed out, without shutting down the government and now has gotten much less than that. so do you believe the president could take this deal and then declare a national emergency anyway? it s possible that the president will in all likelihood take the deal because he can t go down the path of recklessly shutting down the government again. that was a disaster for him. it was a disaster for republicans in the house and the senate and clearly mitch mcconnell and his team over on the other side of the capitol want no part of that any further. now the president may try to declare a national emergency but here s the thing. if it was a national emergency,
credit for doing what is the right thing which is avoiding another government shutdown, realizing that he s not going to be able to get the funding that he wanted, and in standing up against the base to the extent that he needs to stand up to the base. another thing i have felt for a long time is he had caved before because he got all this backlash i mean, caved to his base because he got all this backlash from rush limbaugh and ann coulter. i think if he stood his ground then, he would have been fine. his base is firmly behind him. i think he s done so many things they can point to that they are happy about. in particular probably what is really their most important issue among republicans and not just the base is the court. i don t think he would have been in any peril, frankly. now he s done this and we ll see. we ll see if there is a backlash for him giving in. mike, how worried do you think the president should be politically about legal challenges in court?
covers all aspects like personnel, technology, infrastructure, maintenance, repairs at ports of entry and barrier construction. as we showed you at the top of that $23 billion there s just $1.375 billion in funding for barriers on the southern border covering some 55 miles of new construction which is less than the $1.6 billion for 65 miles of fencing the president turned down in december. far less, of course, than the $5.7 billion he was demanding for more than 200 miles of barrier. the president isn t talking about that number anymore. he s repeating what is a familiar refrain, the claim the wall is already going up. if you listen carefully, he mixes up his tenses so much it s hard to tell what he s trying to say. the border area is happening. it s going to happen at a really rapid pace. we re giving out contracts right now. we re going to have a great wall. it s going to be a great, powerful wall.
initially with money laundering, tax evasion, false statements. now there is apparently proof of the connections between him and kilimnik and the so-called ukraine peace plan, which was attractive to the russians and possibly offered to the trump campaign. there are other connections between the trump twain and man a forth and possibly trump himself. why did he lie about it? was it because he was involved in a cover-up that potentially was encouraged by others involved, whether it was roger stone or others who are trump associates. i still don t understand, if there was nothing untoward about the contacts between russia and all of these people around the president, why does why are so many of them lying about their interactions if everything is on the up and up? why not just tell the truth?
in terms of if he declares a national emergency, tries to, you know, get funds from other sources. it appears there s two sides to that argument, and i think they re still sorting through that. i think there are other things. ted cruz has a bill to use the old el chapo money to build the wall. i think the point is, yeah, he didn t get everything he wanted. he set the terms of the debate. we re talking about border security. there s a way to win the war, maybe losing the battle. i ve mentioned that before when i worked for newt. the government shut down but bill clinton wound up signing a balanced budget. as long as it looks like he s continuing to find ways to do this and he s not finished doing it. do you think they ll see this as a win? you know, i think the president really needs to lead his base. instead of ledding ann coulter and sean hannity and others get them whipped up into a frenzy, the president has to declare victory. look, i have additional money for border sec