Trump Wants $18bn for Border Wall In Exchange for DACA

Local Editor

US President Donald Trump is reportedly asking Congress for a total $33 billion to fund his wall and other border security in exchange for ensuring protections for "dreamers" - illegal immigrants brought to the country as children.

Trump is asking the Congress for nearly $18 billion to pay for the construction of more than 700 miles of his border wall expansion project, according to a report by the Wall Street Journal Friday.

If the funding is approved, the border wall would increase from around 654 miles to nearly 1,000 miles, covering roughly half the length of the entire US-Mexico border.

The plan, which was laid out in a document from the US Customs and Border Protection agency at the Department of Homeland Security and described to the Wall Street Journal by two sources, also calls for an additional $15 billion to pay for "critical physical border security requirements."

The other requests include $1 billion to construct a road, $8.5 billion to deploy 5,000 new Border Patrol agents and $5.7 billion to construct towers and pay for surveillance equipment, unmanned aerial vehicles and other technology.

In total, Trump's vision for the wall would cost taxpayers $33 billion over the next 10 years, according to the report.

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump said he would construct a "big, beautiful wall" along the southern border and promised that Mexico would pay for it.

Later, Trump tweeted that Mexico would pay for the wall "in some form" and "at a later date."

While in office, Trump has insisted that any deal to make the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals [DACA] program permanent must also include funding for the border wall.

However, Senate negotiators were waiting for Trump to release details of his immigration reform plan, which they were promised in mid-December.

On Thursday, a group of Republican Senators met with Trump at the White House to discuss DACA, the Obama-era program protecting some 800,000 immigrants from deportation who were underage when they arrived in the country illegally.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team