Gallego confirms Kelly’s ‘uninformed’ comment about Trump, border wall
Jan 18, 2018, 4:45 AM
(Flickr/Gage Skidmore)
(Flickr/Gage Skidmore)
PHOENIX — President Donald Trump’s chief of staff said Trump has evolved on many issues since he was elected and had some “uninformed” positions on the border wall during the campaign.
In an interview with Fox News, John Kelly said that “there’s been an evolutionary process that this president’s gone through” on issues ranging from Afghanistan to his promised Southern border wall.
Kelly said Trump has “very definitely changed his attitude towards the DACA issue and even the wall” and said that kind of evolution is normal.
Kelly was explaining comments he’d made behind closed doors Wednesday to the Congressional Hispanic Caucus.
In an interview with CNN, U.S. Rep. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) confirmed those reports, saying he heard Kelly say that Trump was “uninformed” on specifics pertaining to the border wall which he touted during the campaign.
“From what I remember, it was discussed that he was uninformed as far as how far the wall would stretch and where the wall would go,” Gallego said, adding that it is often difficult to keep campaign promises.
But Gallego said he wanted to point his attention to another matter at hand: Getting legislation signed into law that would provide protections to young immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children.
Those immigrants, also known as DREAMers, are about 700,000 people who have been offered temporary protections under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.
Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced an end to DACA in September, calling it an an “unconstitutional exercise of authority by the executive branch.”
However, U.S. District Court Judge William Alsup ruled earlier this month that the program must remain in place while litigation over Trump’s decision unfolds.
Gallego and other bipartisan lawmakers, including Sen. Jeff Flake, had been working to get a bill signed by Jan. 19, when the government could shut down.
Gallego said lawmakers explained to Kelly during the meeting that bipartisan deals have made it to the floor in both the Senate and House, which could bring the budget standoff to an end.
But Gallego also said they have been given no direction by the White House, which he claimed is causing chaos not only among Congress, but among the entire Republican Party.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
