white house Trump’s aides warn him border shutdown would be disastrous The president’s economic aides are trying to convince him that shutting down the border would hammer the economy.

President Donald Trump’s senior economic aides are scrambling to impress upon him the potentially dire economic costs of his threat to shut down the U.S.-Mexico border, according to two people familiar with the matter.

Both Kevin Hassett and Larry Kudlow, the president's top economic advisers, have shared papers and data with Trump over the last 36 hours, illustrating the way economic growth could slow even if the president shut down the border for just one day — not to mention the effect on the flow of goods, raw materials and the U.S. supply chain.


Inside the White House, officials frantically spent the day searching for ways to limit the economic impact of shuttering the border, according to two senior administration officials and one Republican close to the White House. One possibility involved closing the border to cars but allowing commercial trucks to continue to pass through. Officials stressed, however, that no final decisions have been made.

Publicly, Republican leaders expressed their own dismay at the threats, which Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called potentially “catastrophic.”

But Trump did not seem swayed. “Sure, it will have a negative effect on the economy,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday afternoon. “But to me, trading is very important, the borders are very important, but security is what is most important. I mean, we have to have security.”

A White House spokesperson did not respond to a request for comment.

The border threat is the second eye-popping policy pronouncement that has unnerved the GOP in recent days, testing Republicans' loyalty to the president heading into a crucial election cycle. Last week, the Trump administration moved to invalidate Obamacare, and the president quickly promised that Republicans would come up with a better alternative, thrusting the party into a health care debate that few wanted.

Morning Shift newsletter Get the latest on employment and immigration, every weekday morning — in your inbox. Email Sign Up By signing up you agree to receive email newsletters or alerts from POLITICO. You can unsubscribe at any time. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

The surprise Obamacare repeal-and-replace push — Trump promised that Republicans would become the "party of health care" — prompted a now-familiar scramble to rein in the president.

Together, the moves have drawn attention away from the good news Trump received late last month when Attorney General William Barr released a preliminary rundown of Robert Mueller's Russia probe findings, saying the special counsel did not uncover a criminal conspiracy between the Trump campaign and Moscow. It was a seismic victory for the president — Barr even said he would not bring obstruction of justice charges against Trump despite Mueller not exonerating the president on that front — and removed a cloud that had been hanging over his entire presidency

In the days since, though, Trump has generated numerous headlines about intraparty feuds and confusion within his own administration with his proclamations on health care and the border.

Republican leaders do not share Trump’s view on closing the border. McConnell said on Tuesday that while he agrees there is a border crisis, stopping all border crossings is not the answer.

“Closing down the border would have potentially catastrophic economic impact on our country and I would hope we would not be doing that,” he said.

Trump’s recent threats to close the southern border have also set off a panic among influential business groups in Washington, which have scrambled to publicly underline the economic stakes of such a move in hopes of persuading the president to back down.

“You have a lot of people who are freaking out over this,” said an executive at a prominent industry group who wasn’t authorized to speak on the record, adding that shuttering the border would result in an unprecedented blow to the economy.

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, National Association of Manufacturers and the American Automotive Policy Council, which represents Ford and General Motors, have all warned in recent days of dire consequences if Trump pulls the trigger.

NAM, which has nurtured close ties to the White House, said Tuesday that businesses stand to lose $726 million for every day the border is closed.

The U.S. auto industry is particularly concerned, facing not only the prospect of a border closure, which would limit the import of essential automobile parts, but also potential tariffs on foreign car imports.

“Within a week, we’d have most of the U.S. auto industry shut down,” said Kristin Dziczek, an expert on the economics of the auto industry at the Center for Automotive Research, a nonprofit think tank based in Michigan.

“Everybody is on board that this would be very devastating. It’s not an industry that you can turn the switch on and off and no damage would be done. It’s not a light switch,” she added, warning that it could contribute to an economic downturn. “Economic recoveries don’t die of old age; they die of policy mistakes — and this is the biggest mistake I can think of.”

Senior officials at Trump-aligned outside industry groups have also privately reached out directly to the White House to stress their concerns, according to a person familiar with the matter. They’ve encouraged White House officials to make the case directly to the president that a border closure could undermine the positive economic headwinds that are so central to Trump’s reelection message.

Neil Bradley, chief policy officer at the Chamber, told reporters Tuesday afternoon that the business group was among those who had expressed concern directly to the White House about Trump’s threat to close the border.

Bradley also appeared to dismiss the notion that the economic pain of a closure would be greatly limited by leaving open cross-border trucking lanes. “This is not as simple as close lane 1, open lane 3 and 4. ... I think it’s much more complicated than that,” he said, adding that even the threat of a border closure has a “chilling effect” on businesses.

Administration officials insisted on Tuesday that the president remains serious about closing the border, though they said he hasn’t made a final decision.

“Our system is absolutely maxed out,” Trump said. “It’s a very unfair thing.”

The president put the onus on Congress to reach an immigration deal. “If we don’t make a deal with Congress, the border’s going to be closed, 100 percent,” he said on Tuesday afternoon.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also expressed those concerns earlier Tuesday.

“This isn’t our first choice,” Sanders told reporters outside the White House. “Our first choice would be for Democrats to actually sit down with us and help fix a broken system to address the national security and humanitarian crisis that exists at our border.”