Chuck Schumer on hot mic: Trump ‘likes us’

Tom Williams | CQ Roll Call | Getty Images

Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., attend a news conference on the Child Care for Working Families Act, which focuses on affordable early learning and care on September 14, 2017.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s candid thoughts on President Donald Trump got caught on a hot mic Thursday.

In the audio from the Senate chamber, the senator from New York talks about his Wednesday night dinner with Trump with an unidentified person.

“He likes us. He likes me, anyway,” Schumer said.

It is unclear who Schumer refers to by “us.” He and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi had dinner with Trump and top aides on Wednesday night. The pair has increased engagement with Trump recently.

After that dinner, the Democratic leaders said they agreed to pursue a deal to protect about 800,000 young immigrants from deportation along with other border security measures but not the president’s proposed wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. Trump on Thursday cautioned that they had not reached a deal. However, he said they were close and insisted that he wants funding for his border wall at some point.

Schumer also outlined some advice he gave to Trump.

“Here’s what I told him. I said ‘Mr. President, you’re much better off if you can sometimes step right, sometimes step left. If you have to step in just one direction, you’re boxed … He gets that,” Schumer said.

The senator also said of Trump: “He’ll make us more productive, too.”