Welcome to Axis ProRata, where we take just 10 minutes to get you smarter on the collision of tech, business, and politics.

Sponsored by Bridge Bank. Be bold. Venture wisely. I'm Danper Mac. On today's show, investors bet big against Lyft and why no one will take responsibility for Facebook's latest user data spill.

But first, closing the border. So last Friday, President Trump tweeted a threat to close the

U.S.-Mexico border, or at least large sections of it, if Mexico, quote, doesn't immediately

stop all illegal immigration coming into the U.S., end quote. So a few things to know.

First, a total border shutdown would do much more than just closed ports of entry to asylum

seekers and arguably cause undocumented immigrants to take more dangerous routes through

unsecured border areas.

It also would theoretically stop all trade between the two countries, which currently amounts

to around one billion of goods per day. Trump told reporters earlier this week that immigration

is a much more important issue to him than trade, but his own top economic advisor, Larry

Cudlow, also said in a different venue that he was working on some ways to protect certain

trucking

routes. So let's call that mixed messages at best, which has got to terrify people like American

farmers who already got hit very hard in the past year by the China trade disputes. Plus,

there are thousands and thousands of Mexican and American citizens in border areas who

cross it each day for work, not to mention

all the tourists. In short, this would create a massive disruption for both countries, which

perhaps is why the border remains open today, six days after the Trump tweet that threatened to close

it, quote, next week. So the question now is if this is just the president blowing off steam

via Twitter,

which has become commonplace, or if it could actually become very consequential policy,

...