Trump pretends he already has a wall as he prepares to cave on funding

Trump is lying to his most diehard supporters and telling them that his border wall is already being built — while at the same time preparing to give in and sign legislation that won’t fund his wall.

“The wall is being built,” Trump wrote on Wednesday.

It isn’t.

For months, Trump has been pretending that fencing being constructed near the border is the same “border wall” that he promised during the campaign would be 1,000 miles long stretching from coast to coast.

Now that Trump is close to passing a bipartisan deal that would ensure continued funding of the federal government — but doesn’t fund his wall, which is the reason Trump shut down the government for a record-long 35 days in the first place — Trump is doubling down on this big lie about wall construction to try to save face.

At his recent campaign rally in El Paso, Texas, supporters held signs demanding, “Finish the wall.” That’s a big change in messaging from their demands to “Build the wall” over the last three years.

Taking their cues from their leader, Trump’s diehard supporters also chanted “finish the wall” in unison at various times during the event — when they weren’t busy attacking journalists, that is.

Trump’s unofficial propaganda partner, Fox News, is a part of the disinformation campaign as well. During “Fox & Friends,” Trump’s favorite show on the network, a large image of a smiling Trump was projected next to text reading “The Wall Is Being Built.”

time to check in on fox news, where i get my most important news pic.twitter.com/jjW6KgKGIx

— Bobby Lewis (@revrrlewis) February 13, 2019

As usual, Trump is lying, and Fox is promoting his lies. The wall cannot be “finished,” because it hasn’t been started.

Trump has demanded $5.7 billion for his racist wall, but the deal in Congress merely offers $1.375 billion for fencing and other barriers — not a wall.

And that offer is $300 million less than the offer Democrats made to Trump in summer 2018, proving once again that Trump is a horrible dealmaker.

The White House has been grumbling that Trump doesn’t like the deal, but has also indicated that he is likely to sign it.

“This has made some progress,” said White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders when asked about the deal, preparing Trump supporters for the likely cave.

If Trump doesn’t approve the deal, it would cause another disastrous government shutdown — which Americans are likely to blame him for, just as they did during the last one.

The last shutdown ended in humiliation for Trump, as his beloved State of the Union was postponed and he had to give in to the demands Speaker Nancy Pelosi had been making all along.

Trump wants to avoid that humiliation, but also save face with his racist core voters who are demanding the wall. So his only option is to lie.

And Fox is helping Trump to declare his mission accomplished, even as it has crashed and burned.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.