Off the wall: Trump denies agreeing to DACA deal, despite Democrats' claim

US President Donald Trump has denied reaching a deal which would see young immigrants protected from deportation without his proposed border wall as a condition. It comes despite a claim to the contrary from two senior Democratic Party leaders.

On Wednesday, Trump invited Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-New York) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-California) to a “working dinner” at the White House.

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According to Schumer and Pelosi, they had a “very productive meeting,” where they discussed crafting legislation that would protect immigrants in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

After the meeting, Schumer and Pelosi released a joint statement that said Trump agreed to “enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that's acceptable to both sides.”

“We also urged the President to make permanent the cost-sharing reduction payments, and those discussions will continue,” Schumer and Pelosi continued.

However, Trump said on Thursday morning that no DACA deal had been reached, saying that “massive border security would have to be agreed to in exchange for consent...”

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders also pushed back after the Democrats released their statement on Wednesday, tweeting that “while DACA and border security were both discussed, excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to.”

During a meeting with Schumer and Pelosi last week, Trump agreed to extend the debt limit and fund the government until December 15, sparking outrage among Republicans.

Earlier, Huckabee Sanders defended Trump’s decision to have the meeting without any leaders of the Republican Party.

“I think it’s pretty disingenuous for people to say he’s only meeting with Democrats,” Huckabee Sanders said, according to the White House. “The President is the leader of the Republican Party and was elected by Republicans. And so the idea that the Republican Party ideas are not represented in that room is just ridiculous.”

In a recent Rasmussen poll, 66 percent of likely US voters said Trump should work with Democrats to advance his agenda. Only 13 percent thought bipartisan cooperation would be bad for the country.

Some Trump supporters, however, were loud about their disapproval of the alleged deal.