WH Still Pretending Shutdown Is Not About Wall, Blames Dems For Inaction

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders stayed true to her new talking points on Friday, denying that the government shutdown is primarily about the wall and blaming Democrats for the lack of compromise.

“[Trump] wants border security,” Sanders said Friday on “CBS This Morning,” proceeding to paint Democrats as soft on illegal immigration.

“I’m not going to negotiate in the press, but the President has been willing to negotiate on this point and the Democrats have not been willing to do anything,” Sanders said of the wall’s price. “That’s the sad part — they care more about keeping our borders open than keeping our government open. They do not want to protect American citizens, but they do want to protect illegal immigrants.”

It is not entirely clear where negotiations stand, or even who’s in Washington to work on them.

What is known is that Trump threatened a veto of a continuing resolution passed unanimously in the Senate last week to keep the government funded, since it did not include his wall money.

Democrats like Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) have indicated that there is wiggle room on general border security, but they are adamantly against funding the wall. Democratic leaders were also floating a deal where they’d allot $1.3 billion for border security about two weeks ago, which was met with little reception from Republicans.

But the odds of compromise seem slight at this point, as House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-LA) told his peers yesterday not to expect any more votes until Democrats take over next week. Soon after, Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC), a close Trump ally, echoed the tone of hopelessness, telling CNN’s Dana Bash that it seems “we could be in for a very long-term shutdown.”

Watch Sanders on CBS here: