thank you. announcer: president trump held a meeting with lawmakers at the white house and talked about a potential agreement to end the government shutdown. he also reiterated his position on border security, saying that there needed to be a down payment on his proposed border wall. he made the comment shortly after the senate refused to move forward with legislation to reopen the government that included border wall funding. pres. trump: mr. great hockey

player, congratulations on your victory. we worked hard. that was a great job. congratulations. thank you all very much. i appreciate it. one suggestion was a prorated down payment for the wall, which i think people would need. the democrats, almost all of them are breaking it, saying walls are good. big difference from what you had two or three weeks ago. we had the vote on our bill, which we won 50-47. but we got one democrat. it was 50-47. as you know, we have to get 60. we don't have 60 votes, so we need democrat support. we didn't get democrat support other than from a wonderful man, as you know, senator manchin, who is doing the right thing for his people. he is doing the right thing for west virginia, frankly. the other bill was 52-44. that included a lot of hurricane relief. some of them really voted for the hurricane relief.

that was 52-44. but you need 60. so that didn't go anywhere. we knew both were not going to go anywhere. and now mitch is negotiating with chuck schumer. we will see what happens. i think they just left a meeting. they just had a meeting. they are going out to see their people. they just left. so we had two bills, i think we did very well. the republicans held, except for two. two were not there. there were unable to be there, so there were two non-votes. but even with two non-votes, i think they would have been good votes for us. that is 50-47. we won. but we need 60 votes because of the 60-vote rule. i just really want to thank the republicans for holding. again, on the other one, that was the opening up your new was 52-44, but you need 60 votes. so it's a long way short. a lot of those votes were based on the fact that there was hurricane relief for certain states. [reporters shouting questions]

reporter: government spending without money for the wall? president trump: i wouldn't be happy. so we have a lot of alternatives. for the most part, people agree -- when i say everybody -- i would say almost everybody. we have to have border security. we have to have a wall in order to have border security. you cannot have border security without a wall. we can play games or we can talk about technology. right now there is an 8000-person caravan, heading our way. congratulations, we have another one. we stopped the first one, we stopped the second one. i wouldn't say that tijuana is too happy. but they are heavily living in tijuana right now. a lot of them have gone back. but we stop them. it is very tough. if we did not have a wall, it would be very hard to stop them. we have the military and the border patrol. they have done an incredible job. i.c.e. has done an incredible job all over the country,

frankly. we have removed thousands of ms-13 and others out of our country. but if we had a wall, we would not have that problem. that would be great. we have a lot of alternatives. i am just honored that almost all the republicans voted for our bill. our bill is the bill that we were really focused on. though he almost all the republicans. the end result was 50-47. the democrats lost one. they came over to our side. they pretty much held and we held. again, we were losing to -- we were missing two the republicans who couldn't vote because they were not here. reporter: is there enough movement to end the shutdown soon? president trump: after this meeting, we will find out. but right now, mitch mcconnell is meeting with chuck schumer, so we will see what happens with their meeting, to see you they can work out something, maybe on a temporary basis. but we have a lot of alternatives. there are a lot of people who want this to happen. i'll tell you who wants this to

happen. the military wants this to happen. because this is a virtual invasion of our country of drugs, of human traffickers, of so many different things, of criminals. it is an invasion of our country and the military wants this to happen, the border patrol wants this to happen. and by the way, border patrol said all of the drones flying up in the air, it doesn't mean nothing when they look down and the see thousands of people rushing our border. the only thing that works is a strong barrier or a wall. reporter: have you talked to nancy pelosi? president trump: i have not. i haven't spoken to nancy pelosi, no. but i'm here. i haven't left. except for a beautiful evening in iraq, i've been here for a long time. reporter: mr. president, wilbur ross said he didn't understand why fellow american workers would need help getting food -- president trump: i haven't heard the statement, but i understand that perhaps he should have said it differently. local people know who they are,

where they go for groceries ande when they go for groceries and everything else and what wilbur was probably trying to say is they will work along. banks are working along. the folks collecting the interest in all of those things work along. that is what happens in a time like this. they know the people they are dealing with and they work along. i think that is probably what wilbur ross meant. i have not seen a statement. >> aren't you worried to leave american diplomats behind? pres. trump: if you look at venezuela that is a sad situation. that was the richest in that area and out as one of the poorest places in the world. that is what socialism gets you. when they want to raise taxes to 70%. watching our future

opponents talking about 70%. they cannot do it for 70%, it would probably have to be twice that number. what happens is you have to take a look at what is happening to venezuela. it is a sad situation. we have our eye closely on venezuela. >> if mitch mcconnell comes to an agreement, would you support it? pres. trump: it depends with the agreement. if they come to a reasonable agreement i would support it. i have other alternatives if i have to. i will use those alternatives. we want to go through the system. we have to have a lawn this country. we have criminals pouring in. they permeate all throughout the country, including places like wisconsin. a lot of different places. that is the problem.

we are doing very well on crime rate compared to past years and past administrations. i think our crime rate would go -- thed i know our drug drugs are pouring in. they come through the ports of entry but the big drugs come from areas where you do not have a wall. you have double wall. you would stop drugs and stop human trafficking. human trafficking, where they tie up women and put duct tape on their mouths and put them in the backseat of a car or a van, they do not come through a port of entry because the people at the port of entry will see that. that is not like hiding drugs in the engine. they have ingenious ideas. these people were ever legit they would become very rich people. what they do is go through the ports of entry, but the big stuff comes through areas where

you have nobody watching. you have hundreds of miles of open space and they go out there and they load it up with drugs or they have women in the backseat of the car's and duct tape all over the place. it is a disgrace. you do not catch them. you do not know the difference between mexico and the united states. they make a left turn after the go 40 miles, five miles in some ands, the make a left turn than they are the united states and they do whatever they have to do. we need the wall. we can all talk about technology. i know more about technology than anybody. if you do not have the wall technology does not work. -- anyl is based technology works only with the wall. it is not going to work otherwise. a lot of the technology is put on top of the wall. they literally put the technology, they fasten it to the wall. then you have drone technology. that is great.

what he going to do, follow the people? once you step into the country, you know what happens, you know what they do. they put one foot in our country and we got them, that is it. the drones do not help us. we have to keep it out. we have no choice but to have a wall or a barrier. if we do not have that it will not work. it is very important. one more question. message toyour federal workers missing another paycheck? ies. trump: i love them, respect them, i appreciate the job they are doing. many of those people not getting paid are totally in favor of what we are doing because they know the future of this country is dependent on having a strong border, especially a strong southern border. we have tremendous violence and crime coming through that order. we have tremendous drugs, we have the human trafficking, we

have ms 13 and gangs poring through the borders and if we do not strengthen the borders we will have a big problem in the future. one of the people i blame as myself, because the economy is so strong, stronger than ever before. right now we have more people working in the united states than has ever worked in this country before. that is a great complement. i blame myself. people come up because our country is doing so well and they want to break through our borders. we want them to come up. we took and more people last year legally than we have in a long time. we need them because we have a lot of companies coming into our country. we need people coming in. i want people to come in but they have to come and legally and they have to come in through merit. they have to be able to help companies and if they do not help companies and our country, we cannot do that.

>> wide you decide to agree to nancy pelosi? is her choice. i could have done it in another location but i think that would be disrespectful to the state of the union. i could have gone to a big auditorium and got 20,000 people in one day, but i think that would've been disrespectful for the state of the union. we want the state of the union when the shutdown is over. >> when will that be? pres. trump: that i cannot tell you. we have a lot of alternatives but we need border security. thank you very much, everybody. thanks, everybody. >> furloughed federal employees are missing another paycheck this week as the partial government shutdown enters its 35th day. yesterday the senate failed to

move forward with legislation to reopen the government by blocking two measures that required 60 votes. the first option offered by republicans included the border wall proposal and a doctor fix. the second -- and a daca. the second measure by democrats would have opened the government without funding for a border wall. a billse approved yesterday to fund the homeland security department until february 28. the legislation does not include money for a border wall and is unlikely to be considered by the senate. c-span's "washington journal" live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. morning, a new government intelligence support on national security threats in the u.s.. also in illinois democratic

congressman jesus garcia will talk about border security. also joining us is cathy chase on how to make roadways safer. be sure to watch c-span's washington journal live at 7:00 this morning. join the discussion. coming up live friday on c-span, the third day of the u.s. conference of layers meeting. discussing ways to combat hate crimes and remarks rome former new york city mayor michael bloomberg. that is followed by the house gaveling in a 2:00 for a brief pro forma session. on c-span two the senate is back to work on a potential solution to the government shutdown. u.s.n c-span3 or from the conference of mayors on gun violence prevention. house homeland security committee bennie thompson gathered former da sets -- dhs

formerls including homeland security jeh johnson to discuss the impact of the government shutdown on the agency and its employees. mr. johnson joined a bipartisan group of former homeland security secretary's to offer a letter to president trump and congress calling for full funding for the department. this is one hour and 50 minutes. [applause] . >> thank you very much. good morning. i em of that same religion you have to talk back. since the trump shutdown has been going on for over a month remember this is his shutdown because on camera he said directly to the american people he would take pride in shutting down the government. 800,000 of the federal employees still have no paychecks since last year they will miss anotr