We read the Times so you don’t have to. President Trump is standing firm on the Wall, a signature issue from the campaign, but according to the New York Times, border security isn’t the only thing he’s shoring up as he negotiates with wobbly allies in the Senate. The President tweeted on Thursday night: “We must BUILD THE WALL, stop illegal immigration, end chain migration & cancel the visa lottery,” he said. “The current system is unsafe & unfair to the great people of our country — time for change!”
 
Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) said, “That’s not what he means, and that’s not what he’s trying to say. There’s going to be border fencing in some areas, there’s going to be vehicular barricades, there’s going to be technology, greater manpower in some areas.” Yet the President was quoted in the same meeting, saying “We need a physical border wall… [we’re] going to have a wall — remember that — we’re going to have a wall to keep out deadly drug dealers, dangerous traffickers, and violent criminal cartels.”
 
Four months after President Trump halted Obama’s DACA program, he is willing to compromise on “Dreamers” in exchange for stronger border protection. As the Republican Senate majority has only fifty-one votes, the President building up to a bipartisan meeting next week where they will examine a written framework. Like with the Individual Mandate repeal in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, President Trump is poised to take half a loaf now on the border, and make his case for the wall during the congressional midterms, getting a mandate to finish the job with the next Congress.