US Republican lawmakers on Wednesday unveiled an immigration package that would tighten border security, end chain migration and fund President Donald Trump's border wall while shielding nearly a million so- called "Dreamers" from deportation.
The legislation was introduced just minutes after Trump said that any legislation that protects such undocumented immigrants would need to fund a wall along the US-Mexico border—one of the primary pledges of his 2016 presidential campaign.
"Any solution has to include the wall because without the wall, it all doesn't work," Trump told reporters at the White House.
"We need the wall for security. We need the wall for safety."
Congress is grappling with how to break an impasse over the "Dreamers".
Trump met with two dozen Republican and Democratic lawmakers on Tuesday at the White House, urging them to craft a compromise that would accommodate the Dreamers but also achieve some immigration reforms.
(Published by Economic Times - January 12, 2018)