Trump focusing on how Open Borders hurts black workers and Latino workers is also excellent. Too bad more conservative groups aren’t out polling blacks in WI about their support for more illegal aliens coming to work in America.

But the longer the shutdown goes on, the more the Dems look bad — and the employees “most hurt” will far more likely to be Dems. It would be fine for Trump to NOT allow them to get paid, nor any back-pay, but I assume the Dems will require this as part of a deal. Still, Trump could say “no” at first.

Remains interesting, and The Art of the Deal doesn’t help much in forecasting / speculating how it is resolved. But my 90% guess says Trump gets enough to say “he won”.

https://libertyunyielding.com/2019/01/08/why-chris-wallace-is-as-wrong-as-the-trump-administration-about-threat-border-crossings/

By J.E. Dyer January 8, 2019

“Do you know how many people tried to cross the U.S. southern border illegally last year? Do you know how many succeeded? Do you know how many were either special-interest aliens or on a terror watch list?

No, you don’t.

No one knows those numbers. We don’t have them. We don’t know.
…
I hate to have to point it out, to people who are being honest and well-meaning, but the fact that we apprehend almost all of the special-interest aliens and known/suspected terrorists at airports is first of all a statistical artifact of the mode of travel. Commercial air travel funnels everyone down physically into convenient counting chutes.

Crossing a 1,300-mile border doesn’t do that. We don’t have the comprehensive information we’d need to proclaim that most terror suspects are trying to enter the United States via scheduled commercial air travel. We only know that that’s how we catch most of the ones we catch.
…
But it’s possible the Trump administration is trying to advance a valid point (if doing so with really counterproductive ineptness). The valid point would be that if we’re catching more than 3,000 potential threats a year coming in through airports, where they’re pretty much bound to be caught if we’ve already flagged them by category or identity, how many are we not catching at the border – where they are NOT bound to be caught, because they’re not bound to be seen and processed?

Until everyone acknowledges that we do not know the extent to which almost all potential threat individuals try to enter the U.S through airports, there’s no point in continuing to yammer at each other.”

“Former longtime Univision anchor María Elena Salinas revealed on Tuesday evening that many Latinos are buying the arguments President Donald Trump is making about illegal immigration.
Salinas, whom the New York Times once described as the “voice of Hispanic America,” told CNN host Don Lemon after Trump’s Tuesday evening Oval Office address that she is saddened that Latinos “are buying some of these arguments against undocumented immigrants” that Trump has been making.

“And it’s very sad to see that our own people, who are immigrants themselves, are attacking these immigrants that are trying to come in, knowing themselves how difficult the situation is in a lot of these Latin American countries,” she continued. “And, you know, they’re buying it, and some people, just like some other Trump supporters, are saying, well, you know, so what if he tells lies, as long as we have lower unemployment among the Latino community.”

In his Oval Office address, Trump specifically mentioned that illegal immigration hurts African-Americans and Hispanic Americans.

“It strains public resources and drives down jobs and wages,” Trump said of illegal immigration. “Among those hardest hit are African-Americans and Hispanic Americans.”

During the 2016 presidential campaign, Trump, in addition to making the economic case for fewer illegal immigrants, also explicitly pointed out that the media often ignore Latino families who have been victimized by illegal immigrant crimes.

Trump ended up shocking the political and media establishments by doing better among Hispanic voters than Mitt Romney did four years before. And though the media have tried to vilify Trump as a “racist” who hates brown people, Trump’s support among Latinos has remained steady.”

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/01/09/pence-nancy-pelosi-a-no-on-border-security-even-if-trump-opens-government/

“Pence detailed a moment during Wednesday’s White House shutdown meeting with Speaker Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. President Donald Trump asked Speaker Pelosi if she would negotiate border security and wall funding if he opened up the government quickly. “The Speaker of the House said ‘no,’” Pence recounted.
…
Security Kirstjen Nielsen also offered details of the meeting.

“I think the president was very calm in trying to continue to put different options on the table to solve this serious crisis at our border,” Scalise told reporters outside the White House. “Last night [the president] laid out some of the problems and challenges we’re facing as a country and how we can get a solution.”

“Today what he did was start to offer some more ideas,” Scalise recounted. He said their teams worked over the weekend, “but at some point the other side has to put a counter offer on the table. ‘No’ is not a valid answer if you’re serious about solving this problem.”

Experts tasked with securing the nation have put the cost of moving toward securing the border at $5.7 billion, a number Scalise referenced. He then rebuked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for jokingly offering just one dollar to address the problem of border security. He said her reaction and refusal to propose a counteroffer is not fair to those Americans missing a paycheck under the shutdown.”

“Corporate interests and the big business lobby have the most to gain from granting an amensty to DACA illegal aliens, as legalizing millions of low-skilled foreign workers would drag down wages for Americans, drive up profit margins for corporations, and leave U.S. taxpayers with the costs.
…
A DACA amnesty would put more U.S.-born children of illegal aliens — commonly known as “anchor babies” — on federal welfare, as Breitbart News reported, while American taxpayers would be left with a $26 billion bill.

Additionally, about one in five DACA illegal aliens, after an amnesty, would end up on food stamps, while at least one in seven would go on Medicaid.

Any plan to give amnesty to DACA illegal aliens that does not also include provisions to halve legal immigration levels would give amnestied illegal aliens the opportunity to bring an unlimited number of foreign relatives to the country through the process known as “chain migration.”

The chain migration inflow from a DACA amnesty has the potential to reach nine million foreign nationals arriving in the country, as every two newly naturalized citizens bring about seven foreign relatives to the U.S. with them.

Despite major opposition from Trump’s base of supporters to for an amnesty-for-wall funding deal, the plan has been touted in White House discussions, as it is favored by the billionaire donor class.”

I’m not totally averse to legalizing really-truly-brought-here-as-a-baby people (with the usual good-character caveats), but doing it without FIRST securing the border and ending the chain migration, anchor babies, and visa-equals-lifetime-visitor travesties is a firm “no” for me.