Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney said President Trump’s backing off demands for a concrete wall for a steel barrier shows his willingness to reach a deal on border security that has led to a partial government shutdown.

“That is – if that is not evidence of our willingness to solve the problem, okay, because again, what’s driving this is the president’s desire to change the conditions at the border,” Mulvaney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” in an interview that aired Sunday.

“And if he has to give up a concrete wall, replace it with a steel fence in order to do that so that Democrats can say, ‘See? He’s not building a wall anymore,’ that should help us move in the right direction,” he added.

Mulvaney, who is also the director of the Office of Management and Budget, suggested that Democrats are purposely trying to stall negotiations over the wall.

“The discussion immediately turned to a bunch of technical requirements or technical requests that the Democrats were asking for the first time ever in these negotiations,” he said. “So I think this is going to drag on a lot longer. I think that’s, that’s by, by intention.”

The partial government shutdown, which has resulted in around 800,000 federal workers either being furloughed or working without pay, is now in its third week.

In a news conference last Friday, Trump suggested he would back off his demands for a concrete wall, which was a signature campaign promise.

“I think we’ll have to build a steel wall, as opposed to a concrete wall,” he said. “A see-through wall made out of steel is far stronger than a concrete wall.”

Administration members Vice President Pence, son-in-law Jared Kushner and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen met with aides to congressional Democratic leaders on Saturday, but didn’t reach any consensus.