It is already well-known that President Donald Trump regularly watches the Fox News' morning program "Fox & Friends." The question that remains, though, is whether he will follow any harebrained idea that the hosts bandy about on their show. On Tuesday, conservatives on the show suggested that Trump forget about Mexico, or even Congress, paying for his planned border wall, and instead focus on finding corporate sponsors.
"If I were advising Donald Trump, I'm a national fundraiser, I would say, 'You know what, here's an idea, why don't you see if you can't get it privately funded?'" said Noelle Nikpour, a former congressional candidate in Florida as well as a Republican strategist. "Privately funded, meaning, if you donate a certain amount — let's just say that the number is $12 billion to get this wall implemented, alright? So you had the $12 billion dollar figurehead, and you go to donors, you go to different people and you say, 'Look, if you will contribute towards this privately, look what your money's going to,' I mean, what a better deal that you're a part of this."
Co-host Brian Kilmeade seemed to agree with Nikpour, arguing that businesses which donate "can get a tax break on this. Or you could do it the fly out the sponsor way: This wall brought to you by Modell's. Or Aetna. Why not do it?"
Nikpour ran with Kilmeade's point, citing media mogul Ted Turner as an example of someone who "gave a billion dollars to the UN Foundation, and look at this, I don't think he paid taxes for — federal taxes for a lifetime."
On Monday, President Trump told conservative reporters that he was not going to continue pressing for a border wall in talks for a catch-all spending bill, so as to avoid a government shutdown. Instead he is going to revisit the issue of border wall spending in September.
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