President Donald Trump asked Congress to give the administration $3 billion to start constructing a wall along the US–Mexico border. On Tuesday, Republicans said they won't provide it — at least not in a funding bill to avoid a government shutdown this week.

A Democratic aide confirmed to BuzzFeed News that Republican leadership presented Democrats with a spending plan that doesn't include funding for the wall, stalling progress on one of Trump's biggest and most controversial campaign promises. Republican lawmakers hope that the exclusion of wall funding will help win over enough Democratic votes to keep the government from shutting down at midnight on Friday.

"I think it was just kind of a recognition that it was going to be very hard to get votes to move this bill forward," Sen. John Thune, the number three in the Senate GOP leadership, said of the decision to leave out wall funding this time around.

The proposed plan does, however, contain funding to increase border security, the Washington Post reported.

Democrats have long said that they will not support a funding package that includes money for a wall along the entire southern border. "If they insist on the wall, they're insisting on the government shutdown," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Monday night. Schumer added on Tuesday that Democrats could support other forms of border security, however.

Some Republicans were also wary of funding the border wall this week, citing concerns about its cost and effectiveness. "I don't know anybody that thinks that's possible," Sen. John McCain said of building an actual 2,200-mile wall. The Arizona senator said Tuesday that a better option might be fencing monitored by drones.

The Trump administration insisted as recently as last week that Congress include border wall funding in the package. But on Monday night, Trump reportedly told a group of journalists from conservative outlets gathered at the White House that he could be satisfied, for now, with funding for other border security measures. And on Tuesday morning, Trump adviser Kellyanne Conway told Fox News that funding for the wall remained a priority, but could happen later this year. (Congress needs to pass another government funding bill in September.)

"If that's so, I think he's facing reality," Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch said of the reports that Trump would hold off. "It doesn't mean that he can't have some form of a wall. There's different forms that he can use," Hatch said.

The administration has repeatedly said that regardless of what happens with the spending bill, it remains committed to building the wall.