As a partial U.S. government shutdown hit the two-week mark, President Donald Trump and congressional leaders prepared to meet on Friday over ways to break an impasse pitting his demand for building a border wall against Democrats’ call for alternative security measures.
About 800,000 federal workers have been affected by the Dec. 22 closure of about one-quarter of the federal government as Trump withheld his support for new funding until he secures $5 billion to start building the wall along the U.S.-Mexico border that he promised during his campaign.
Such a wall, he has argued, is needed to stem the flow of illegal immigrants and drugs over the southwestern border. When he ran for president in 2016, he vowed Mexico would pay for the wall, which it has refused to do.
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