Exclusive– Frank Gaffney to Trump: Use Veto Power to Secure Wall Funding

Center for Security Policy president Frank Gaffney is asking President Donald Trump to use his veto power to demand funds for his proposed wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

During an interview with SiriusXM Patriot’s Breitbart News Daily, Frank Gaffney told Breitbart News Editor-in-Chief Alex Marlow that Trump has leverage over the Republican-controlled Congress when it comes to funding border construction projects and he should use it.

“I guess I’m in the camp where if we don’t get this border secured, we’re not going to have a country,” Gaffney said. “My guess is that kind of supersedes my calculations about the politics of this at the moment”:

The president has leverage in one sense, he can veto legislation. It requires two-thirds of both houses to override his veto in order for things to get done. I think the fact that he can say, “Look, I mean it. I am not going to do this. And you’re not going to get what you want, your goodies, your social spending, your $10.8 billion for Central America, whatever else you might be looking for unless you come to terms with me on this deal.” [Emphasis added]

And $5 billion, let’s face it, is chump change. This is about the principle of whether Donald Trump as President of the United States is going to be able to dictate sufficiently to a Democratic congress that he can get his agenda through or he’s going to just simply do whatever they allow him to do. And that isn’t going to make for a very good two years. [Emphasis added]

Gaffney said the fight for border construction funding is not only about the nation’s sovereignty and stopping illegal immigration, but also Trump’s 2020 re-election bid.

“This is what is at stake here,” Gaffney said. “It’s about the future of his presidency and I’m afraid that this is a bad day for that as well.”

Listen to Gaffney’s full interview here:

On Wednesday evening, the U.S. Senate passed a stopgap spending bill to keep funding the federal government for the next couple of months. This spending measure does not include any money for Trump’s bollard fencing projects at the U.S.-Mexico border.