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President Donald Trump doubled down on his criticism of the U.S. immigration system on Friday during the seventh day of the partial government shutdown that is affecting over 800,000 federal employees. The commander in chief’s demand for $5 billion for a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border may be sitting in a bill passed by the Republican-led House last week, but Congress is not set to deliberate on a funding package until the beginning of next year.

As the stalemate in Washington between the White House and lawmakers continues, Trump said that he is looking at not just leaving the government shutdown in place, but may also close the entire southern border.

“We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with,” President Trump said on Twitter.

Although trade on the North American continent is now governed by the newly-implemented U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA) signed into law by President Trump and his Canadian and Mexican counterparts, he went back on social media to criticize former U.S. trade relations with Mexico. He said that the failure of the recently-replaced North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) lead to the U.S. losing “75 billion” a year in trade deficits. He added that he would consider closing the border, which, to him, looks like a “profit making operation.”

“Bring our car industry back into the United States where it belongs. Go back to pre-NAFTA, before so many of our companies and jobs were so foolishly sent to Mexico. Either we build (finish) the Wall or we close the Border,” Trump added.

Director of the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) and acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney appeared on the “Fox and Friends” morning show Friday and was asked if President Trump is serious about potentially closing the border to stave off illegal immigration.

“Yes, I think he is,” Mulvaney replied.

“[Senate Minority Leader] Chuck Schumer voted for border security in 2006, he voted for it again…in 2011. It seems like Democrats really like border security when there’s a Democrat in office and don’t like it when Donald Trump is in office,” he explained.

The chief of staff said that during a meeting last week with the the president, Senate minority leader, Vice President Mike Pence, and others, a deal may have been had after some ground was gained over funding discrepancies. However, “the more we’re hearing,” Mulvaney added, “[House Minority Leader] Nancy Pelosi is preventing that from happening.

Amid news that a new migrant caravan is forming in Honduras following two previous instances in 2018, President Trump has also threatened to cut foreign aid to Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador, accusing the Central American countries on Twitter of “doing nothing for the United States but taking our money.”

Reducing foreign aid to the countries would require congressional approval through the appropriations process. Though, with Democrats regaining the majority in the House on January 3, that is highly unlikely to happen.

After five terms in the Virginia House of Delegates, Richard “Dickie” Bell (R-Staunton) has announced that he will not seek re-election in the 20th House District in the upcoming statewide elections in 2019. Delegate Bell, who said that he is retiring to spend more time with his family, also remarked that “today’s political climate” is disconcerting and the “partisan divide” makes good governance “more difficult.”

Before he was elected to the state legislature in 2009, he served for more than 13 years as a city councilman in his hometown of Staunton, spending 14 years before that on various city boards and commissions. A graduate of Blue Ridge Community College, James Madison University, and Old Dominion University, Delegate Bell also served in the U.S. Navy Hospital Corps from 1967 to 1973. Afterwards, he became a special education teacher and coach, since retiring.

During his tenure in the House, Bell was a strong supporter of the Second Amendment, child welfare, and education initiatives, being appointed as vice chairman of the House Education Committee earlier this year. He is also a member of the House General Laws and House Health, Welfare, and Institutions committees.

The announcement of the legislator’s retirement came in an email he sent out Thursday morning, the News Leader reports.

“In 2009 I was elected to serve the citizens of the 20th House District as their Delegate to the General Assembly. It was a tremendous honor then, and it remains a tremendous honor now,” Delegate Bell said. “Public service has always been a calling for me, and I am pleased and proud to say that I have answered that call.”

He added that while his nearly four-decade career in public service “has not been without its challenges,” he said that “it has been a labor of love.”

Bell said that he has always had a “loyal staff” that have “supported me, shielded me, defended me and protected me from the very first day of this journey. I will be forever grateful for that blessing of loyalty.”

“My family has been incredibly supportive of everything I have done and they have suffered the slings and arrows so common in politics just as I have. Their support has never wavered and they have made many sacrifices on my behalf without ever complaining,” he said in the email. “They have been my sounding board, my confidantes, my defenders, and my team. I will continue to spend the rest of my life repaying them for their love and support.”

The atmosphere of lawmaking even on a state level seems to be not far from what it is on the national stage as Bell says that he encountered the brunt of “politics” on Bank Street upon arriving in Richmond almost 10 years ago. Though, he explained that he always waded through the muck to represent his constituents in the counties of Augusta, Highland, and Rockingham and the city of Staunton in the best way possible.

“Despite my years in local politics, when I went to Richmond I learned ‘things I never knew I never knew,'” the delegate said.

“I often tell people that unlike most others who run for office we had no money, no organization behind us and no clue what we were in for. There were times when I would wish ‘I didn’t know now what I didn’t know then’ but through it all I have always done my best to serve the citizens of the 20th District and represent their best interests,” he said.

“That brings us to 2019,” Bell added. This coming year all 140 members of the General Assembly are up for re-election – one election past in infamous “blue wave” of 2017 that ushered in a razor-thin, one-member Republican majority in the House.

The delegate said he “tried to be a good representative and a good public servant,”  but that being “a good politician never really mattered to me because I don’t have a fondness for politics and I never have.”

“It’s a game I just don’t play well. I care more about people than politics. Today’s political climate saddens me and the partisan divide we see at every level of government makes public service more difficult,” he explained.

Though, he said the “decision to retire at this time has absolutely nothing to do with elections.”

“I have never been concerned about winning or losing elections. I am a competitor and I love competition and I have always believed that working hard and doing things the right way produce successful outcomes,” Bell said.

In the email, he referenced a quote from James Freeman Clarke, an American theologian and author, “’a politician cares about the next election, a statesman cares about the next generation.’ It’s not original to me but I think it describes my service well, and I believe my legislative record supports that claim. It would be an honor to someday be remembered as a statesman.”

Bell remarked about his time in the nearly 400-year-old legislative body that “it has been an honor to serve and I am proud of my service.”

“However,” he adds, “it is not my highest honor.”

He explained that his highest honor “would be the honor and blessing of being a husband and father and a humble servant of my Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. I have never apologized for my faith or my love for this country and my battle cry has always been ‘family first.’ Those are the things of which I am proudest.”

“Let me assure you that I am fine. I am not ill or sick, in fact I’m very healthy, but the clock is still ticking and no day is promised,” he stated.

Bell, who says he and his wife Anne are expecting their first grandchild in January, said a growing family “most certainly is part of the decision” to retire.

“Anne and I treasure the friendships that have sprung out of my time in public office and we hold them dear. Whatever it takes to maintain those relationships we plan to do,” he opined. “The opportunity to have more time to spend with my family and repay them for their loyalty and sacrifice over the years, as well as time for a new granddaughter has a strong pull on me and has me very excited.”

“I am not sad that my public service is coming to an end, but rather I am very grateful that the opportunity ever came along in the first place,” he said. “It has been a great, exciting ride!”

Remarking on vacating his seat in the coming year, Delegate Bell said, “as Thomas Jefferson remarked upon his retreat from the public life, ‘I will leave with my hands as clean as they are empty.’ It is a true blessing to be able to leave on your own terms.”

“Thank you all for your support. It has been overwhelming and humbling,” Bell concluded. “It has always been my honor and my humble pleasure to serve as your Delegate. May God richly bless each and every one of you, may God bless the Commonwealth of Virginia and may God bless the United States of America.”

As day six of the partial government shutdown is nearing its end, both houses of Congress have made plans to meet in Washington on Monday, putting off any action to reopen the government until New Year’s Eve at the earliest. Negotiations on a funding bill between the House and Senate have showed no signs of progression since federal funding ran out on December 21 at midnight.

Although President Donald Trump insisted earlier this month that he would take ownership of the government shutdown over the money to construct the U.S.-Mexico border wall, he quickly aimed his animus towards the opposition party in the hours after no deal was to be had. For days, he has been admonishing Democrats in the media – from his desk in the Oval Office and on his smartphone – as over 800,000 federal employees have been affected.

President Trump, who was busy on social media today, took to Twitter to again blame Democrats for the shutdown.

“‘Border Patrol Agents want the Wall.’ Democrat’s say they don’t want the Wall (even though they know it is really needed), and they don’t want ICE. They don’t have much to campaign on, do they? An Open Southern Border and the large scale crime that comes with such stupidity!”

CNN reports that White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also criticized Democrats on Thursday, saying in a statement that the liberal party had “decided to go home” over the Christmas holiday rather than stay in Washington to negotiate. President Trump abandoned Christmas plans with his family at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, remaining in the White House to take questions from reporters and to hopefully engage in negotiations – apart from his and First Lady Melania Trump’s secret trip to Iraq for the commander in chief to visit American troops on Christmas.

Regardless, House Republicans passed their own bill last week that includes $5.7 billion in border wall funding, but the Senate has yet to deliberate the measure, adjourning just hours before the shutdown began last Friday. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said last week before the shutdown that even the simple majority needed to pass the funding package via the 51-member “nuclear option” was not there. Some GOP senators, including Jeff Flake (R-AZ), reportedly sent letters to the office of the majority leader claiming they would not vote to pass a measure that included funding for President Trump’s U.S.-Mexico border wall.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (CA-12) has relayed to the White House that her caucus, which is set to take the majority on January 3, has offered Republicans “three options” to reopen the government that include money for border security, but does not include funding for “the President’s immoral, ineffective, and expensive wall.”

When the Republican majority in Congress reconvenes on Monday, December 31, they will have less than three days to pass a funding package before Democrats take over the reigns as the party in power in the House until at least January 2021. Although the blame game is being played with which party caused the shutdown, since House Democrats plan on bringing legislation forth on the opening day of the 116th Congress, President Trump must know that the shutdown could backfire on both him and the Republican Party in the opening act of the 2020 General Election season.