BORDER/BUDGET/HEALTHCARE/OBAMACARE(ACA)/POLITICS/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WALL: “Fights over money to pay for a border wall — as well as Obamacare subsidies and an infusion of resources for the military — are threatening to trip up congressional talks over a funding bill to head off a government shutdown Friday [4-28-17].
Bipartisan negotiators have spent weeks methodically working through hundreds of issues to set spending across all federal agencies for the rest of the fiscal year, with White House officials largely on the sidelines being briefed on various issues.
But Democrats are warning that the White House, which stayed out of the fray during much of these talks, is ratcheting up demands, insisting on including border wall money in exchange for continuing to pay insurance companies subsidies to bolster the Obamacare marketplace, which they say is a nonstarter. President Donald Trump highlighted the issue again over the weekend.
‘The Democrats don’t want money from budget going to border wall despite the fact that it will stop drugs and very bad MS 13 gang members,’ Trump tweeted Sunday.
But White House officials said late Sunday that they did not want the government to shut down over any impasse in the spending talks — and that’s a directive straight from the President.”
-Deirdre Walsh and Ted Barrett, “Border wall fight looms as White House, Capitol Hill scramble for deal to avert shutdown,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, April 24, 2107 9:06am