(CNSNews.com) - White House Chief of Staff Gen. John Kelly told Fox News Wednesday night that President Trump wants to deal with the DACA issue to "take it away," and the president also has come to believe that there are places where his long-promised border wall "would not be realistic."
Earlier on Wednesday, in a meeting with the Hispanic Caucus on Capitol Hill, Kelly reportedly told lawmakers that some of Trump's campaign pledges on building a border wall were "uninformed."
Fox News's Bret Baier asked Kelly about that on Wednesday night:
Well, I met at my request today with House Hispanic Caucus. I've done that three other times when I was at DHS. Met with them today, and had a discussion on a range of issues. I was mostly listening, because I've heard them so many other times and they know what the administration perspective is. But in any event, as we talked about things, where this president is and how much he wants to deal with this DACA issue and take it off the -- take it away, I told them--
You know, there's been an evolutionary process that this president has gone through as a campaign, and I pointed out to all of the members that were in the room that they all say things during the course of campaigns that may or may not be fully informed. But this president, if you've seen what he's done, he has changed the way he's looked at a number of things. He's adjusted the way he's looked at the South Asia strategy, Afghanistan. He's very definitely changed his attitudes towards the DACA issue and even the wall.
Once we briefed him, when I was at DHS, and told him that the real experts on defending the Southwest border, the Customs and Border Protection men and women came in, did a, you know, a survey of the border. There are places where hydrographically, geographically, a wall would not be realistic. There are other parts of the Southwest border that are so wild and untamed that there is no traffic that goes through them. There's other places, we think about 800 miles additional wall to include the 600 that are already in place, the fencing, would suffice.
So he has evolved in the way he's looked at things. Campaign to governing are two different things and this president has been very, very flexible in terms of what is within the realm of the possible.
"And Mexico's not going to pay," Baier told Kelly.
"We have some ideas on how things like visa fees, renegotiation of NAFTA, what that would mean to our economy," Kelly responded. "So in one way or another, it's possible that we could get the revenue from Mexico but not directly from their government."
Asked about President Trump's apparent change of mind between last Tuesday and last Thursday on the Durbin-Graham border/DACA plan, Kelly said he became chief of staff "to make sure that the president of the United States is informed across the spectrum of an issue and he hears both sides of the story -- pros and cons and everything in between."
Sen. Dick Durbin called President Trump early last Thursday to tell him about a bipartisan DACA/border solution, Kelly said the president "was ecstatic."
"He (Trump) said we've got money for the wall," Kelly told Baier. "We've got various other things that the president is interested in, the end to chain or family-based migration and the end of the visa lottery, money for the wall. The president was thrilled, invited them over. So I then called other members of the Senate because I was surprised at how fast this was happening."
Kelly said other senators involved in the process "were completely uninformed that there had been a bipartisan initiative led by both Senators Durbin and Graham, apparently. They were uninformed of that, and these are men that have been informed or had been involved in this process.
"So I then went over to the Hill to talk to someone who's been a friend for 20 years, remains a friend, Senator Graham -- I knew him in the House when he was a freshman, all the way up to this point. I got his impression of what this deal was, but it was clear to me that, again, that it was bipartisan, no doubt, but it was from a kind of a focus group of bipartisan senators.
"I then went to the House side to talk to McCarthy -- Congressman McCarthy, Congressman Goodlatte, and the Speaker to find out if they had been involved in this process. They had not been. So at that point, again, I had two senators coming over with what I would characterize as a possible solution to the DACA issue but it certainly occupies one end of the spectrum.
"So the president then asked that we invite some other senators and members of the House to come over -- he asked for that," Kelly said. "And again, it's how I now force the staff to do business. I don't want the president to hear one side of a story. The president likes to talk about issues. He likes to hear everyone's side. He prefers, not prefers, but he certainly enjoys the intellectual discussion and wants people to raise issues that perhaps are issues that he doesn't believe in.
"Well, in the course of the conversation, he (Trump) said, well, this is certainly something we can talk about but this is not what I had in mind, but it's a start point. We can talk about it, just like Mr. Goodlatte who was there, he has a proposed bill that is a great start point to talk about. So this begins the process."
Kelly said Trump wants $20 billion for 700 miles of additional border wall, including some places where fence now exists. He also wants chain migration limited to "nuclear" families – spouses and minor children, not extended families.
Kelly admitted that a deal satisfying the president's requirements is "unlikely" to happen by Friday, when government funding temporarily runs out, but he noted that the DACA expiration date is March 5, which means there's more time to work on a deal acceptable to all sides.
"There's no doubt in my mind there's going to be a deal. So long as men and women on both sides are willing to talk," Kelly said.
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