Texas Gov. Rick Perry wants President Barack Obama to send National Guard troops to the U.S.-Mexico border.
He told Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity Wednesday night that the president “can unilaterally direct the Department of Defense to put those troops on the border.”
The border-state governor described his conversation with President Obama in Dallas Wednesday.
“Mr. President, you can secure the border. We’ve done it. We’ll show you how to do it, but I said, ‘You really can’t do it unless you allow the National Guard to come in and to play a very prominent and visible role,'” Perry said of his conversation with the president.
Perry was critical of Obama’s request for $3.7 billion for the border situation.
“Less than two percent of it is for border security,” he told Hannity in a sit-down interview. “And less than $100 million of that [$3.7 billion] is going to go for border security.”
Perry insisted the supplemental bill is not even necessary and the president already has the power to “unilaterally direct the Department of Defense to put those troops on the border.”
The Texas Republican said Obama could direct the Department of Defense to use Title 32 to pay for the troops to secure the border.
Perry reiterated his skepticism of the budget request and hinted that there was possibly more to the supplemental request than being reported.
“From my perspective, the supplemental isn’t about securing the border. It’s about something else. You’ll have to get the president to tell you what he wants those dollars for,” he told Fox News.