10 January 2019•Update: 10 January 2019
By Michael Hernandez
WASHINGTON
President Donald Trump slammed a table and abruptly walked out of talks aimed at resolving the ongoing partial U.S. government shutdown, Democrats who he was meeting with said Wednesday.
The president, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said, threw a "temper tantrum" when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected an appeal from Trump to agree to the $5.7 billion he is seeking for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
"He just walked out," Schumer told reporters at the White House after meeting with Trump. "He couldn't get his way, and he just walked out of the meeting."
"He said, 'if I open the government, you won't do what I want,'" Schumer added. "That's cruel. That's callous. And that's using millions of innocent people as sort of pawns and it was wrong."
Shortly after his meeting with Schumer and Pelosi concluded, Trump took to Twitter to assail the Democratic leaders.
"I asked what is going to happen in 30 days if I quickly open things up, are you going to approve Border Security which includes a Wall or Steel Barrier? Nancy said, NO," he wrote. "I said bye-bye, nothing else works!"
The shutdown, now well into its third week, has resulted in roughly 800,000 federal workers being forced to either work without pay if their roles are deemed "essential" or stay home from work.
Many federal departments and agencies that rely on those staffers have either halted operations altogether or selectively cut services amid the lapse in funding.
Trump earlier Wednesday went to Capitol Hill to rally Republicans around his call for federal funding for the wall, saying after the meeting the party is "totally unified" as the shutdown's effects mount.
The shutdown is already the second-longest in U.S. history and is likely to soon eclipse the current record of 21 days.
