Donald Trump is playing magic math to pretend the Monument to Old White Bigotry he promised is going to get funded. At the moment he's pretending he's going to raid the Pentagon's budget to get the money. Malcolm Nance is not amused:
BRIAN WILLIAMS: Malcolm, you've devoted so many years of your life to service in the military, it came up today, the military did, and I want to read you the context. President trump who repeatedly insisted Mexico would pay for the wall. Is pushing the US Military to fund construction of his signature project. He has told advisers he was spurned in a large spending bill last week, when lawmakers appropriated only 1.6 billion for the border wall. He's suggested to Jim Mattis and congressional leaders that the Pentagon could fund the sprawling project sighting a national security risk. That would indicate the people coming across this border are somehow combatants or potential combatants? And do you have any problem with this?
MALCOLM NANCE: Certainly, I have a problem with it. And everyone who is associated with the defense arena is going to have a problem with this. First off, someone really needs to sit him down with a copy of "Schoolhouse Rock" and show him precisely how the government works.
Funding and government funding is the mandate of the Congress. It cannot just come out of the defense department. This is not a favor that General Mattis can do for the president, which is dip in there and take out $25 billion of allocated funds which goes to war fighting, which goes to combat preparedness, which goes to building new ships and systems and making sure that they come online overtime or goes to the military families and health care. Why he would think that he could just go and order the defense department and do that is just indicative of the way he thinks about the world, that CEO attitude: "If I point to you, you'll make this happen." This is never going to happen and I just think it shows a level of desperation on the president's part that he thought he could get away with even asking the question.
BRIAN WILLIAMS: I just thought you might have an opinion if I asked the question. Malcolm Nance, it's why we always have you on.
