https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-mexico-wall-funding-money-pay-us-border-government-shutdown-trade-deal-a8721341.html
Donald Trump has claimed that, despite his repeated promises that Mexico would pay for a wall on US southern border, he ”obviously never meant Mexico would write a cheque”.

Mr Trump has repeatedly promised that Mexico would pay for the wall, with the website for his 2016 campaign having previously claimed that Mexico would make a “one-off” payment of “$5-$10 billion”.

Instead, the president has most recently claimed that Mexico would pay for the wall through changes to trade policy his administration has negotiated to replace the North American Free Trade Agreement. That new deal, the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA), has not been approved by Congress yet but the president said on Thursday that it "probably will be".

The USMCA will mean Mexico will be "paying for wall indirectly, many, many times over," Mr Trump said on Thursday. He then boarded Air Force One to fly to McAllen, Texas, where he hopes to drum up support for Congressional approval for US taxpayer funding to build the wall.