White House in a state of 'panic' as aides scramble to keep Trump from closing the border: CNN reporter

CNN's Kaitlan Collins revealed on Wednesday that White House aides had spent the beginning of the week in a panicked effort to keep President Donald Trump from following through on his threat to close the U.S.-Mexico border, a move that could deeply damage the national economy.

"There was a bit of a freakout after the president threatened to close down the border and that threat seemed more serious than the previous times he's made it," Collins said. "Now the president seems to be backing off that, after he has been getting advice privately that that would be a terrible idea because it would disrupt the economy and cause all kinds of issues." She added that Trump's border story had changed by Tuesday evening, cutting to footage of the president telling his audience at the NRCC dinner that he had changed his mind because Mexico was stopping immigrants at the border.

"Not only are you hearing that from the president, you're also seeing him on his Twitter feed try to shift the blame to Congress," Collins said, indicating Trump was taking second run at changing his own narrative. "That comes as a direct result of a sense of panic that happened in the West Wing on Monday when aides were trying to figure out a way to keep the president from closing the border."

A scrambling White House was "trying to come up with an idea to present new immigration laws to Congress," she said, "so they could shift the blame for these record-breaking immigration numbers away from the administration and the White House and on to lawmakers."

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