he also talked about the partial government shutdown and his demand for border wall funding. the briefing included members of the national border patrol council. . >> good afternoon. thank you all for coming on short notice and happy new year. welcome back. it is good to be back we will kickoff 2018 slightly different i would like to welcome a very special guest for an appearance in the briefing room our president donald j. trump. >>.

>> hello everybody. with a beautiful place. happyy new year. happy new year to everybody. >> i just want to start off congratulating nancy pelosi to be voted speaker of the house that is a great achievementu u and hopefully we will work together and get lots of things done like infrastructure and so much more. so hopefully we will have a lot of things we can get done together that will be a little bit different so i congratulate him on that tremendous achievement. i just want to explain to

folks i have known very well over the last fewk years. people have been extremely supportive of what we're doing at the border. they are tough, they are smart they can think and i love our country they have everybo quality and i know them well to have those qualities that we need in our country. they have done a fantastic job at the t border with ice and border patrol and a man who has become a friend , brandon, i will say this, brandon has been a stall wart in terms of justice for people and fairness and yes we have had some pretty tough situations it doesn't get much tougher's i just want to thank brandon and i will have them introduce themselves right now and also say a few words about the wall, the barrier, whatever you want but essentially we need protection

in our country the people of our country want it. i have never had so much support as i haveia had in the last week for my stands for border security and border control and for frankly the wall or the barrier. i have never had anything the polls coming in in terms of people writing in and tweeting doing whatever they have to do i've never had this much o support we have done things that have been very popular. so i will ask brandon to just step forward and say a few word words. he apprehended 17000 criminals trying to get across the border. that is just one category there are plenty of others. the other thing that has been so incredible is what they have done in terms of drugs and stopping drugs with that everything else those that

are trying to come to theat southern border i want brandon to come up and introduce our friends and very brave people. >> thank you mister president we appreciate the support from border control and ice. i am the president of national border patrol council i have been an agent 21 years. i can personally tell you from the work i have done on the southwest border that physical barrier the war on - - the wall actually works you hear a lot ofte tech talk there are experts that say they don't work. i promise you if you interview border patrol agents they will tell you the walls work. i worked in arizona ten years. we didn't have physical barriers and illegal immigration and drug smuggling was out of control absolutely. we built those walls and the

exponentially. if you look where we have built walls, they havelu worked. they have been an absolute necessity for border patrol agents in securing the border. we need those physical barriers and we appreciate president trump and all of his efforts in getting us those barriers. there is a lot of talk saw - - a lot of talk on the shutdown that federal employees do not agree with the shutdown but i will tell you that is not true and with that i would like to introduce the vice president of the national council and long time border patrol agent out of the tucson sector he would like to say a few words about the shutdown. >> thank you. i am vice president national border patrol council. i want everybody to take the time to understand what is going on. we are all affected by thee shutdown. we have skin in the game.

however, it comes down to border security. we are extremely grateful to president trump and we fully support what he is doing to take care of our nation's borders and the future of the united states. it has nothing to do with political parties. ask yourself this question. if i come to your home do you want me to knock on the front door or do you want me to climb to that window clicks we the president to secure our nation's borders. >> hello everyone. i am the vice president national border patrol council i am also border patrol agent on the california border. i see the criminals they apprehend every day those that are coming into the country i have been deporting a lot of these people back to their

country unfortunately once we deport them they do not stay there those that have been released from jail will come right back into the united states. if we have a physical barrier or a wall that would stop that. again thanks to president trump for advocating for border patrolal agents and again we ask encouragement to fund border security. thank you. >> this meeting was set up a long time ago but it just came at a very opportune time while sitting in the oval office working on different plans and ways to stop the problems that we have in our country and other countries have problems , dm non- - - the economy makes it even more so because we do so well. unemployment is now three.7 percent and that's among the lowest we have ever had in 50 years and among certain groups.

so i just appreciate them being here. let's talk about the importance of theal wall. and they said without a wall you do not have border security. without a strong form of barrie barrier, without a security. do you see what was just put out on social media where the people that are rushing the border having the drones fly overhead nobody knows a lot more about technology certainly than i do. having drones they are all fine but they will not stop the problems that this country has. we have never had more people wanting to come to the united states having to do with the economy and otherpr things that we are doing great as a country but the more we do the

more people want to come in. thank you very much it is an honor to be with you glad you came. i'm glad we came out here the first time i have ever done thi this. i'm very proud of that because you have done a fantastic job. think you all. thank you all very much. [inaudible conversations] [inaudible conversations] . >> he is not taking any questions at all. [inaudible conversations]

. >> the senior members of trump campaign meeting with the russian emissary produced by a secret government to harm hillary. so presumably they would use it if they found it useful so they agreed to conspire or collude with russia not when asked but throughout the rest of the campaign trump and his lieutenants again and again

and again deny the russians doing anything