Trump Offers Temporary Protections for ‘Dreamers’ in Exchange for Wall Funding

WASHINGTON — President Trump, facing a growing public backlash over the partial government shutdown, shifted course on Saturday and offered Democrats a deal: temporary protections for roughly 700,000 young undocumented immigrants in exchange for $5.7 billion in funding for a wall along the southern border.

But the proposal, which Mr. Trump unveiled in a 13-minute address from the White House, appeared dead on arrival in the Capitol. Speaker Nancy Pelosi rejected it even before Mr. Trump spoke, and Senator Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader, denounced the offer as “not a compromise but more hostage taking.”

With the shutdown entering its fifth week and polls showing a majority of the public blaming Mr. Trump, the president’s advisers have been searching for an exit strategy. Saturday’s speech grew out of talks that Vice President Mike Pence and the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, have had in recent days with lawmakers including Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader.

The proposal was Mr. Trump’s first public offer to Democrats since the partial shutdown began nearly a month ago. It came after an acrimonious week of tit-for-tat politics, in which Ms. Pelosi told the president he could not deliver his State of the Union address in the Capitol until the shutdown was over, and the president retaliated by grounding a plane that was supposed to take Ms. Pelosi on a fact-finding mission to Afghanistan.