'Exorbitantly Expensive': 24 Senators Introduce Bill to Nix Trump's Border Wall

Building the wall is too expensive and is not the smartest measure, according to the lawmakers.

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — A group of twenty-four US Senate Democrats led by Tom Carper introduced a bill on Thursday to rescind President Donald Trump's executive order to build a wall along the US-Mexico border.

"Spending billions of taxpayer dollars to wall off the remainder of the border is an exorbitantly expensive and an ineffective substitute for a smart, layered approach to border security," Carper, who spearheaded the bill, said in a statement.

Carper argued that if Trump wants to strengthen US national security and border protection, he should work with Congress to build on the progress made on that issue over the past several years.

If the legislation is adopted, it would retroactively take effect on January 25, the same day president Trump signed an executive order to initiate the construction of the border wall.

Earlier on Thursday, White House released a budget outline for the 2017 fiscal year, which allocates $3 billion for the Department of Homeland Security to implement the executive order on border security and immigration enforcement.