WASHINGTON: With no weekend breakthrough to end a prolonged partial government shutdown, President Donald Trump is standing firm in his border wall funding demands and newly empowered House Democrats are planning to step up pressure on Trump and Republican lawmakers to reopen the government.
Trump showed no signs of budging on his demand more than $5 billion for a wall along the US-Mexico border, though on Sunday he did offer to build it with steel rather than concrete, a concession Democrats panned.
With the shutdown lurching into a third week, many Republicans watched nervously from the sidelines as hundreds of thousands of federal workers went without pay and government disruptions hit the lives of ordinary Americans.
White House officials affirmed Trump’s funding request in a letter to Capitol Hill after a meeting Sunday with senior congressional aides led by Vice President Mike Pence at the White House complex yielded little progress. The letter from Office of Management and Budget Acting Director Russell Vought sought funding for a “steel barrier on the Southwest border.”
The White House said the letter, as well as details provided during the meeting, sought to answer Democrats’ questions about the funding request. Democrats, though, said the administration still failed to provide a full budget of how it would spend the billions requested for the wall rom Congress. Trump campaigned on a promised that Mexico would pay for the wall, but Mexico has declined refused.
The letter includes a request for $800 million for “urgent humanitarian needs,” a reflection of the growing anxiety over migrants traveling to the border — which the White House said Democrats raised in the meetings. And it repeats some existing funding requests for detention beds and security officers, which have already been panned by Congress and would likely find resistance among House Democrats.
Trump sought to frame a steel barrier as progress, saying Democrats “don’t like concrete, so we’ll give them steel.” The president has already suggested his definition of the wall is flexible, but Democrats have made clear they see a wall as immoral and ineffective and prefer other types of border security funded at already agreed upon levels.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi intends to begin passing individual bills to reopen agencies in the coming days, starting with the Treasury Department to ensure people receive their tax refunds. That effort is designed to squeeze Senate Republicans, some of whom are growing increasingly anxious about the extended shutdown.
Among the Republicans expressing concerns was Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine, who said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell should take up bills from the Democratic-led House.
“Let’s get those reopened while the negotiations continue,” Collins said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Adding to concerns, federal workers might miss this week’s paychecks. Acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that if the shutdown continues into Tuesday, “then payroll will not go out as originally planned on Friday night.”
Trump reaffirmed that he would consider declaring a national emergency to circumvent Congress and spend money as he saw fit. Such a move would seem certain to draw legal challenges.
Incoming House Armed Services Committee Chairman Adam Smith, D-Washington, said on ABC’s “This Week” that the executive power has been used to build military facilities in Iraq and Afghanistan but would likely be “wide open” to a court challenge for a border wall. Speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union,” Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff called the idea a “nonstarter.”
Trump also asserted that he could relate to the plight of the hundreds of thousands of federal workers who aren’t getting paid, though he acknowledged they will have to “make adjustments” to deal with the shutdown shortfall.
Democrats plan more pressure on Trump to reopen government
Democrats plan more pressure on Trump to reopen government
- Trump showed no signs of budging on his demand more than $5 billion for a wall along the US-Mexico border
- With the shutdown lurching into a third week, many Republicans watched nervously from the sidelines as hundreds of thousands of federal workers went without pay
After accepting US deportees, South Sudan wanted sanctions relief for top official, documents show
- In July, South Sudan became the first African country to receive third-country deportees from the US
JUBA: After agreeing to accept deportees from the United States last year, South Sudan sent a list of requests to Washington that included American support for the prosecution of an opposition leader and sanctions relief for a senior official accused of diverting over a billion dollars in public funds.
The requests, contained in a pair of diplomatic communications made public by the State Department this month, offer a glimpse into the kind of benefits that some governments may have sought as they negotiated with the US over the matter of receiving deportees.
In the documents, the US expresses “appreciation” to South Sudan for accepting the deportees and details the names, nationalities and crimes for which each individual was convicted.
In July, South Sudan became the first African country to receive third-country deportees from the US, Rwanda, Eswatini, Ghana and Equatorial Guinea have since received deportees.
The eight deportees to South Sudan included nationals of Mexico, Cuba, Vietnam, Laos, Myanmar and South Sudan itself.
Contentious deportations
They arrived in the South Sudanese capital of Juba after spending weeks on a US military base in Djibouti, where they were held after a US court temporarily blocked their deportation. Six of the eight men remain at a residential facility in Juba under the supervision of security personnel.
South Sudanese national Dian Peter Domach was later freed, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, while Jesus Munoz-Gutierrez, a Mexican, was repatriated in September.
South Sudanese officials have not publicly said what long-term plan is in place for those still in custody. The third-country deportations were highly contentious, criticized by rights groups and others who expressed concern South Sudan would become a dumping ground.
Details of the deal between the US and South Sudan remain murky. It is still unclear what, if anything, South Sudan may have actually received or been promised. The documents only offer a glimpse into what the South Sudanese government hoped to get in return.
In other cases, Human Rights Watch said it saw documents showing the US agreed to pay Rwanda’s government around $7.5 million to take up to 250 deportees. The US will give Eswatini $5.1 million to take up to 160 deportees, according to the group.
For South Sudan, in one communication dated May 12 and marked confidential, South Sudan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs raised eight “matters of concern which the Government of South Sudan believes merit consideration.” These ranged from the easing of visa restrictions for South Sudanese nationals to the construction of a rehabilitation center and “support in addressing the problem of armed civilians.”
Request to lift sanctions
But an eye-catching ask was for the lifting of US sanctions against former Vice President Benjamin Bol Mel as well as Washington’s support for the prosecution of opposition leader Riek Machar, the now-suspended first vice president of South Sudan who faces treason, murder and other criminal charges in a controversial case.
The allegations against Machar stem from a violent incident in March, when an armed militia with historical ties to him attacked a garrison of government troops. Machar’s supporters and some activists describe the charges as politically motivated.
Bol Mel is accused of diverting more than a billion dollars earmarked for infrastructure projects into companies he owns or controls, according to a UN report. He wielded vast influence in the government and was touted by some as Kiir’s likely successor in the presidency until he was dismissed and placed under house arrest in November.
Bol Mel was also viewed as a key figure behind the prosecution of Machar, one of the historical leaders of South Sudan’s ultimately successful quest for independence from Sudan in 2011.
Machar was Kiir’s deputy when they fell out in 2013, provoking the start of civil war as government troops loyal to Kiir fought forces loyal to Machar.
A 2018 peace agreement brought Machar back into government as the most senior of five vice presidents. His prosecution has been widely criticized as a violation of that agreement, and has coincided with a spike in violence that the UN says killed more than 1,800 people between January and September 2025.
The UN has also warned that a resurgence of fighting has brought the country “back to the edge of a relapse into civil war.” Machar is under house arrest in Juba while his criminal trial proceeds slowly.
In its communications with the US, South Sudan also asked for sanctions to be lifted over South Sudanese oil companies “to encourage direct foreign investments,” and for the US to consider investing in other sectors including fossil fuels, minerals and agriculture.
When asked if the US government had provided or promised South Sudan anything in return for accepting the deportees, a State Department official said, “In keeping with standard diplomatic practice, we do not disclose the details of private discussions.”
A spokesman for South Sudan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Thomas Kenneth Elisapana, declined to comment.
US aid cuts
Despite accepting the US request to admit deportees, relations between the two governments have been strained in recent months.
In December, the US threatened to reduce aid contributions to the country, accusing the government of imposing fees on aid groups and obstructing their operations.
The US has historically been one of the largest donors to South Sudan, providing roughly $9.5 billion in aid since 2011. Over the years, South Sudan’s government has struggled to deliver many of the basic services of a state, and years of conflict have left the country heavily reliant on foreign aid.
