President Trump emerged Saturday from a meeting with Congress’ Republican leaders at Camp David and outlined an ambitious legislative agenda for 2018, including the budget, infrastructure, a border wall, immigration and beefing up the military.
He called the agenda setting sessions “great meetings” that had been “transformative in certain ways.”
The president said it would be “hard to top” the accomplishments of his first year in office, but they were going to try.
“We are very well prepared for the coming year. We finished very strong,” he said, mentioning the tax cuts, ending the Obamacare individual mandate and opening the Alaska National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to energy exploration.
Flanked by Republican leaders, including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, Mr. Trump projected a unified GOP front on the 2018 agenda.
Mr. Trump did not mention welfare reform in brief remarks to reporters. But when asked about the issue, he said it was something that was important and he would try to accomplish it in a way that would garner support from Democrats.
He also stressed the need for Democrats to support immigration measures, including fixing the soon-to-expire temporary amnesty for “Dreamers” and spending $18 billion for a border wall.
“I think it is something that [Democrats] would like to see happen and something that I would like to see happen,” he said of the fix for Dreamers, the illegal immigrants who were brought to the U.S. as children.
He stressed that a key goal of border security would be stopping a flow of illegal drugs into the US., including opioids that have fueled an addition epidemic thought the country.
“One of the things we are discussing and discussing very powerfully is drugs pouring into the country and how to stop it, because it is at a point over the last number of years [that] it has never been like this,” said Mr. Trump.
• S.A. Miller can be reached at smiller@washingtontimes.com.
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