WASHINGTON $25 billion "big, beautiful" wall along the U.S.-Mexico border already has been downsized to a $5.7 billion request for about 150 miles of new barriers.
The fight has cost him 35 days of a government shutdown, several points in most surveys of his approval ratings and the pain of criticism from his right flank when he offered Democrats — to no avail — a three-year safe harbor for about 1 million immigrants in exchange for the smaller request.
Now, with a special House-Senate committee trying to hammer out a deal on border-security spending by Feb. 15 and Trump threatening to use executive powers to circumvent Congress if they don't, the question for proponents of the wall is just what would constitute a victory at this point — and whether it would come in the policy arena or on the political battlefield.
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