The White House announced Friday its intention to raise about 8,000 million dollars for the construction of the wall with Mexico, 6,600 of them through a declaration of national emergency that would be added to the 1,375 million approved by Congress.
“Thanks to this declaration, the president will have access to some 8,000 million dollars for the construction of the wall on the southern border,” White House interim cabinet chief Mick Mulvaney announced at a telephone press conference.
Even before Congress approved Thursday a budget proposal that included $ 1.375 million for the construction of the border wall, the president announced his intention to declare a national state of emergency to be able to scratch more federal funds with which to carry out his draft.
The president, Donald Trump, aspires to raise about 8,000 million dollars – an amount well above the 5,700 million dollars initially requested by the White House – to build some 376 new kilometers of border barrier (234 miles) on the border South of the country.
According to White House sources told reporters today, although the amount is significantly higher, the Government’s intention is still to build those 376 kilometers of barrier, formed by steel poles and that “it will not be a concrete wall”, after a agreement reached on the matter with the democrats.
“One of the reasons why we have located more than 5.700 million is to guarantee that we have the necessary funds to carry out the project,” said a senior White House official, who asked not to be identified.
The intention of the Government is to obtain funds from the Departments of Defense and the Treasury.
In total, the Administration would transfer 6,000 million dollars from the Pentagon (2,500 million of its game for the fight against drug trafficking and 3,500 million of its budget for the construction of military installations) and the remaining 600 million would come from the fund of confiscations by drugs of the Treasury .
This kind of declaration temporarily grants the president a special power to deal with a crisis. Trump will have to argue, therefore, that the arrival of undocumented immigrants and the entry of drugs through the Mexican border requires urgent and extraordinary measures. (EFEUSA) .-
