President Trump visits border in California
President Donald Trump visited Calexico Friday afternoon. He took part in an immigration roundtable at the El Centro Sector Border Patrol headquarters at 12:45 p.m., and departed at 1:30 p.m.
Trump visited a newly completed section of the US-Mexico border fence that is replacing an older part made during the Vietnam War.
Watch: Border wall construction begins in Calexico
Air Force One touched down at the Naval Air Facility in El Centro around 11:45 a.m. this morning.
Calexico is the closest border town to the Coachella Valley, only 92 miles separate Coachella and Calexico.
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News Channel 3’s Jake Ingrassia will be in Calexico covering Trump’s visit. Watch News Channel 3 at noon, 5 pm, and 6 pm for coverage and follow @JakeKESQ on Twitter.
{“url”:”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ/status/1114187642503983105″,”author_name”:”Jake Ingrassia”,”author_url”:”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ”,”html”:”&#lt;blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”&#gt;&#lt;p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”&#gt;We’re in &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/hashtag/Calexico?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;#Calexico&#lt;/a&#gt; bringing you coverage from the US-Mexico border as protestors prepare for the arrival of the President later today. Stay with us &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/KESQ?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;@KESQ&#lt;/a&#gt; &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/etKrxiumjs”&#gt;pic.twitter.com/etKrxiumjs&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/p&#gt;– Jake Ingrassia (@JakeKESQ) &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ/status/1114187642503983105?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;April 5, 2019&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/blockquote&#gt;n&#lt;script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″&#gt;&#lt;/script&#gt;n”,”width”:550,”height”:null,”type”:”rich”,”cache_age”:”3153600000″,”provider_name”:”Twitter”,”provider_url”:”https://twitter.com”,”version”:”1.0″}
{“url”:”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ/status/1114190984319983616″,”author_name”:”Jake Ingrassia”,”author_url”:”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ”,”html”:”&#lt;blockquote class=”twitter-tweet”&#gt;&#lt;p lang=”en” dir=”ltr”&#gt;Yasmin Espinoza, a Mexican-American from Palm Springs, is here protesting. &#lt;a href=”https://t.co/eEXGTPnMaX”&#gt;pic.twitter.com/eEXGTPnMaX&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/p&#gt;– Jake Ingrassia (@JakeKESQ) &#lt;a href=”https://twitter.com/JakeKESQ/status/1114190984319983616?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw”&#gt;April 5, 2019&#lt;/a&#gt;&#lt;/blockquote&#gt;n&#lt;script async src=”https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js” charset=”utf-8″&#gt;&#lt;/script&#gt;n”,”width”:550,”height”:null,”type”:”rich”,”cache_age”:”3153600000″,”provider_name”:”Twitter”,”provider_url”:”https://twitter.com”,”version”:”1.0″}
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Calexico officials originally expressed their concerns with the possibility of Trump shutting down the border, but on Thursday, he announced he would delay closing the border with Mexico for a year.
Calexico’s economic commissioner said he hopes Trump gets a first-hand look at the current conditions of the Calexico West port of entry.
“It’ll highlight the need for the port, for the expansion, for the security. But an overall picture, it highlights what’s going on,” said Ben Horton, economic commissioner, Calexico.
The port is stuck in its final phase of construction due to a lack of funding.
Vice President Mike Pence and U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen visited Calexico to examine the progress on construction last April.
