'Hostage-taking': Democrats reject Trump's offer to secure border wall and end shutdown
House聽Speaker Nancy Pelosi said the proposal to provide temporary protections for some undocumented immigrants was聽"unacceptable".
Sunday 20 January 2019 09:09, UK
Donald Trump has offered to extend temporary protection for people brought to the US illegally as children in a bid to end the government shutdown.
The US president said he wanted to "break the logjam" but stuck to his demand for $5.7bn (£4.5bn) to fund his proposed wall on the US-Mexico border.
He offered to extend protection for "dreamer" immigrants - who entered the US illegally when they were young with their parents - for another three years, allowing them access to work permits.
Democrats were quick to reject the proposal, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer calling it simply "more hostage-taking".
There are about 700,000 "dreamers" who are currently protected from deportation under a programme that allows them to work but not get citizenship - a programme Mr Trump has been trying to rescind.
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The president is also offering to extend protections for immigrants who came to the US as a result of war or natural disasters in their home countries.
Speaking from the White House, Mr Trump said he was offering a "common sense compromise both parties should embrace".
"I'm here today to break the logjam and provide Congress with a path forward to end the government shutdown and solve the crisis on the southern border," he said.
The president said the border wall would not be a concrete structure "from sea to shining sea" but rather "steel barriers in high-priority locations."
His new proposal also includes £800m in humanitarian aid, £805m in funding for drug detection technology and an additional 2,750 border agents.
He added that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell will bring his proposal for a vote in the Senate this week.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said: "[Mr Trump's] proposal is a compilation of several previously rejected initiatives, each of which is unacceptable and in total, do not represent a good faith effort to restore certainty to people's lives.
"They are a non-starter."
The shutdown, now in its fifth week, is the longest in US history and has left 800,000 federal workers unpaid.