Trump to sign bill to avoid shutdown, free $8bn for wall.

WASHINTON: President Donald Trumpplans to sign a compromise border security measureFriday and then announce that he is using executive action, including declaring a national emergency, to spend $8 billion for border barriers, a White House official said.The move will end, for now, a bitter standoff with Congress over his signature campaign promise.

But it will likely spark a new constitutional dispute over whether the President is overstepping his authority.The initial news of Trump's decision came via Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who said Trump would sign the bill to avoid a shutdown and then declare a national emergency at the same time.

The White House official says Trump is expected to announce that he will use executive action to draw on a variety of administration funding sources to help finance construction of his wall on the border. A national emergency declaration is expected to be one part of that.

The official confirmed the President is set to announce the total amount to be in the range of $8 billion. The official did not specify where all of that money would come from or whether the White House executive action would withstand a court challenge.

Democrats are likely to take the matter to court.A separate White House official said Trump will both sign the funding bill and the paperwork for his executive actions, including the national emergency, at a 10 a.

m. Friday event in the White House Rose Garden.

That White House official said the funding will break down as:$1.375 billion from the Homeland Security appropriations bill. This money cannot be used to build a wall but can be used to build other types of border barriers due to the way the bill is written$600 million from the Treasury Department's drug forfeiture fund, which would come from an executive action$2.5 billion from the Defense Department's drug interdiction program, which would come from an executive action$3.5 billion from the Defense Department's military construction budget, which would require a national emergencyThe series of events was set in motion earlier Thursday in the Senate floor announcement from McConnell, who said he would drop his opposition to the national emergency move in order to advance the government funding measure.

Speaking on the Senate floor Thursday, McConnell sought to reassure lawmakers of the President's position before taking a vote on the plan, which falls short of providing the $5 billion in border wall funding Trump had...