subject to an immediate court challenge and even trump's advisers have told him that it probably would not work legally. but there are not many other paths out of a shutdown that at midnight becomes the longest in modern american history. jim acosta traveled with the president and file this had report. >> reporter: president came to the border to get a sense of the situation down here. talked with law enforcement officials and other border patrol agents. at one point the president described the situation as being under attack. he said the nation is under attack down here on the border. it was an odd case to make because he was sitting in one of the safest communities in the country, mcallen, texas. but yet the president tried to make the case that this community and other communities along the border are under attack trying to ebobolster his case potentially to declare a national emergency. >> we're certainly under attack