Trump reaffirms border wall need on call to supporters: ‘We’re going to win’

President Trump told supporters Tuesday that he’s fighting for a border wall because it’s needed, not because he made a campaign promise to build it.

“It has nothing to do with a campaign promise,” Mr. Trump said in a conference call, according to the Associated Press. “It has to do with the fact that we need this for our country.

“We’re going to win,” he insisted. “We’re not going back until it’s over. We’re going to build this wall. It’s going to happen.”

Democratic leaders have refused Mr. Trump’s demand for $5.7 billion to build a border barrier, saying in part that the president is trying to fulfill a 2016 campaign pledge as he gears up for re-election. The impasse has led to a 25-day partial government shutdown.

The House will skip its planned week-long vacation that had been scheduled for next week to work on ending the government shutdown, Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer announced Tuesday.

The move avoids what would have been an embarrassing spectacle of lawmakers heading home for vacation as many of their constituents suffer from the shutdown.

The House will not be in session Monday, which is the federal holiday to commemorate Martin Luther King Jr. But Mr. Hoyer warned colleagues they could be called for votes as early as Tuesday.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell also said his chamber will be in session next week if there’s no shutdown solution before then.

Mr. Trump mocked Democrats for their refusal to negotiate over his demand for a border wall — the major issue that led to the shutdown — and chided them for fleeing town last weekend.

Several Democrats went to Puerto Rico for a political confab, sparking embarrassing photos of some of them on sunny beaches while workers in Washington struggled through a massive snowstorm.

Three West Virginia Republican state legislators announced Tuesday that they plan to introduce legislation that will help fund Mr. Trump’s border wall.

The bill would divert $10 million from a roughly $200 million state budget surplus to help build the wall along the southern border.

In Washington Tuesday, Democratic lawmakers rejected Mr. Trump’s invitation to lunch for shutdown negotiations at the White House, as the president seeks to break apart unity behind House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s opposition to border wall funding.

“Today, the president offered both Democrats and Republicans the chance to meet for lunch at the White House. Unfortunately, no Democrats will attend,” said White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. “It’s time for the Democrats to come to the table and make a deal.”

Instead, Mr. Trump hosted nine Republican House lawmakers for talks on how to end the shutdown.

Despite the attempt at an end-run around Mrs. Pelosi, the speaker gave her blessing for Democrats to attend the lunch, a top House Democrat said.

“Is he inviting people to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to really try to solve this problem or to create a photo op to project a false sense of bipartisanship?” said Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, who said the Democrats were cautioned against being used as political pawns.

Democrats who were invited by the president but didn’t attend included Reps. Lou Correa of California and Stephanie Murphy of Florida, co-chairs of the Blue Dog Coalition.

A Correa spokesman said the lawmaker “welcomes the opportunity to talk with the president about border security, as soon as the government is reopened.”

Ms. Murphy said she couldn’t attend because of a scheduling conflict with an organizing meeting for the House Ways and Means Committee. She was receiving her subcommittee assignments at that meeting.

“I have attended meetings with the president at the White House before, but a scheduling conflict prevented me from accepting this invitation,” she said in a statement. “However, I continue to believe the Senate should pass and the president should sign the bills reopening government that the House already passed. As a former national security specialist at the Pentagon, I look forward to having a meaningful, bipartisan discussion about the best way to secure our country.”

Also rejecting the president’s invitation were Democratic Reps. Charlie Crist of Florida, David Scott of Georgia and Abigail Spanberger, a freshman whose Northern Virginia district is home to tens of thousands of federal employees.

The White House has been targeting freshmen House Democrats elected in districts that backed Mr. Trump in 2016, some of whom have spoken in favor of border barriers. Mr. Trump recently said he thought Democrat unity was beginning to “break” on the border fence issue.

A Pelosi aide said the speaker welcomed the opportunity for members to see what she had been dealing with during the shutdown standoff.

Mr. Trump walked out of his last meeting with Mrs. Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, saying they refused to negotiate any funding for a border fence or wall even if he agreed to end the shutdown.

The White House said Democratic leaders are stonewalling on a solution.

“As Senator Schumer and Speaker Pelosi refuse to negotiate, President Donald J. Trump and his team are working hard to find solutions to solve the humanitarian and national security crisis at the border and reopen the government,” Mrs. Sanders said. “The president has a proposal on the table that includes additional technology at ports of entry, allows minors from Central America to seek asylum in their home country, and physical barriers between ports of entry made of steel instead of concrete.”

The Republicans who attended the lunch were Reps. Susan Brooks of Indiana, Rodney Davis of Illinois, Doug Collins of Georgia, John Katko of New York, Brad Wenstrup of Ohio, Jodey Arrington and Van Taylor of Texas, Anthony Gonzalez of Ohio, and Clay Higgins of Louisiana.

After the Republican-only lunch at the White House, GOP lawmakers said Democrats should come back to the table.

“I thought I was coming to a bipartisan luncheon,” Mr. Wenstrup said, calling the Democratic no-shows “disappointing.”

Democrats say the most bipartisan answer on the table is to approve bills to reopen the government and postpone the border wall fight until later.

The president told the annual Farm Bureau convention Monday in New Orleans that the wall is only one of many campaign promises that he made. He noted that he cut taxes as promised, cut regulations and opened up the Alaskan National Wildlife Refuge to oil exploration.

“We’ve done most of what we said,” the president said. “I have actually done more than I promised.”

He said Democrats are fighting his border security proposal only “because of the 2020 election.”

A White House aide said although the shutdown hasn’t been caused by a campaign promise, it’s also “insulting [for Democrats] to say that a campaign promise shouldn’t be kept.”

⦁ S.A. Miller contributed to this report.