Congress

Trump Says He’ll Shut Down The Government

Written by SK Ashby

Speaker Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell met with Trump at the White House last week where, according to lawmakers who spoke to Politico, Trump tentatively agreed not to force a government shutdown by demanding money for his fantasy border wall.

The GOP leaders reportedly presented Trump with a plan to avoid a shutdown that includes them somehow managing to miraculously complete the appropriations process in about three weeks.

The Senate majority leader and House speaker laid out to Trump that they will prioritize less controversial bills before this fall's Sept. 30 funding deadline. McConnell (R-Ky.) and Ryan (R-Wis.) hope to fund the majority of the government through the appropriations bill process by the end of September, and leave a brutal fight over border wall funding until later in the year.

Congressional Republicans haven't completed the appropriation process a single time since gaining total control of Congress in 2015 so you'll have to forgive me if I don't even entertain the idea that they'll complete the appropriations process in September.

House Republicans are only scheduled to be in session for 19 days between September and November and fiscal 2019 begins on October 1st.

In any event, Trump spent most of the weekend rage-tweeting and that included a threat to shut down the government over border wall funding.


It's not Democrats that Trump needs to worry about. Republicans have repeatedly proven themselves incapable of passing their own bills and it was Republican leaders he spoke to at the White House last week where he agreed not to pick a fight over this, not Democratic leaders.

I don't necessarily believe Trump is actually willing to veto the continuing resolution to fund the federal government that we know Congress will eventually pass ahead of the fiscal deadline.

Trump has had plenty of opportunities in the past to shut down the government, and it did in fact briefly shut down twice earlier this year, but Trump never vetoed anything. Congressional Republicans did it all on their own.