Rep. Katie Hill said she’s fine with a wall: The conflict between congressional leaders and the president is over semantics.
“For many of us, there’s not really doubt that some kind of physical barrier is necessary,” she said said in a Fox News appearance on Saturday. “I think the challenge is that we’ve gotten so hung up on the semantics, really on both sides. Gosh, I can’t tell you how much I’ve come to hate the word ‘wall,’ and many of us have.”
But for Hill, whose district includes a federal air traffic control center, a federal prison, and other federal law enforcement professionals who are essential personnel and are working without being paid during the shutdown, wants one thing before negotiations over a physical wall start.
“We can’t talk about any of this until the government is open,” she said.
The partial government shutdown, which became the longest in U.S. history as it entered its fourth week Saturday, is the result of a stalemate between President Trump and congressional Democratic leaders over more than $5 billion in funding for a physical wall.
Hill, a congressional freshman, defended fellow California Democrat House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, saying she is in a tough spot.
“I think we’re in a place where the people who elected us say, ‘Don’t give in on this. This isn’t what we elected you for.’ And so there’s a place where we have to draw the line,” she said. “But I think that again, that line that we’re all consistent on as Democrats, open the government first and then we’ll talk. You will not get everyone happy on either side of the aisle with whatever solution we’ve ended up landing on.”
She maintained that she, like some of her cohorts, is in favor of a physical wall.
“Democrats are for border security, too, and part of that is physical barriers,” she said.
