President Donald Trump said Tuesday the government won't reopen until funding is secured for his border barrier, and he plans to go to the border in January to visit a new stretch of wall.

"I can't tell you when the government is going to be open. I can tell you it's not going to be open until we have a wall, a fence, whatever they would like to call it," Trump said in the Oval Office after a Christmas call with US troops.

Negotiations between congressional Democrats and the Trump administration over the President's demands for a border wall have so far not yielded an agreement, and the shutdown will continue until at least Thursday, when the Senate returns to Washington. Both sides seem entrenched in their opposing stances and it's possible parts of the government could remain closed until the new Congress is seated in the first week of January, when Democrats will take control of the House.

Trump repeated a claim made a day earlier -- without explanation -- that he'd recently approved 115 miles worth of border barrier. The White House hasn't provided any further details about the claim, which Trump first made on Twitter on Christmas Eve. See full story...