Dems should ask for an itemized list for those $5.7 billion:

[DetlefK]

That number has to come from somewhere.

What would we get for those $5.7 billion?
How many miles of wall?
What kind of wall?
How thick and how high?
Who would do the work?
Who would provide the materials?
What kind of materials?
Bought from whom?
Delivered by whom?
At which price?
Who would provide the machines?
What kinds of machines?
Bought or leased from whom?
Delivered by whom?
At which price?
Who would do the manual labor?
How many workers of which profession?
How many work-hours of which profession at which rate?
How would they get to the worksite?
Will they live on-site while the wall is being built in the middle of nowhere?
For how long?
Who will provide the amenities to the workers?
What kinds of amenities?
At what price?
How much is for buying the land?
How much is for land surveyance?
How much of that is for the engineers who design that wall?
Who are those engineers?
Who decided to hire them?
What are their qualifications?
At which price were they hired?
How much is for earth-moving?
How much is for building the wall?
How much is for upkeep?
How much is buffer for emergency-expenditures?
How was this buffer calculated?
Who made those calculations and which data are they based on?
Who hired the guys who made those calculations?
At which price?





Trump essentially demands a $5.7 billion down-payment to who-the-hell-knows some private contractors and there isn't even a plan what those contractors would be supposed to do in exchange for getting those $5.7 billion.

[samnsara]

1. my gosh i thought they at least asked for that...and bids from 3 companies!

[RockRaven]

2. From what I've heard/read the "negotiation" sessions (i.e. contrived photo ops) with Chuck and Nancy

and especially the ones where Chuck and Nancy sent aides instead have included Dems asking for concrete plans (pun marginally intended) so that the merits -- or lack thereof -- of said plans can be assessed in the context of what said plans cost, and Trump's people responding with hemming and hawing.

The dollar number Trump and Repukes are demanding is not directly correlated to a specific part of a specific plan, which makes the shutdown all the more ridiculous and irrational. The shutdown isn't about about a wall, nor border security, because there is no benchmark being aimed for which this money would allow to be achieved. It is about having a political fight for the sake of fighting with Dems on Trump's terms not their's, to distract the public from Trump's policy failures (esp. foreign and economic), to force Repukes to demonstrate their fealty to Trump.

[OneBro]

3. They did.

At least according to Senator Tester in his speech posted here: https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211660183

[EarnestPutz]

4. John Tester's speech on this issue didn't come up...

...a while ago when I brought this issue up on DU.

https://www.democraticunderground.com/100211630019

Folks were divided at that time, some thinking it was a good idea and others
not wanting to make it sound like a negotiation.

[EarnestPutz]

5. DetlefK's litany of questions is much more extensive...

...than what I suggested, really getting into the details looking for all
the opportunities for waste and fraud endemic in government contracting.

[EarnestPutz]

6. Hey, here's a thought. Trump has never, to my knowledge, railed against...

...fraudulent government contracting, cost overruns and bribery.
Could it be that this cuts too close to the bone when stacked up
against his own business practices and dealings with sub-contractors?
(Hint - Of course it does).

[DeminPennswoods]

7. Van Holland pointed out that the Senate gave Trump

the exact amount of money (1.3B) his own budget shop requested for "border security" in the DHS budget request. That fact has become lost in the ongoing reporting of the shutdown.

Dems need to start saying if DHS needed more for border security, they should have asked for it when they submitted their initial budget. And if they need the money, they need to submit a request for increased funding.