Every year, Congress faces the same budgetary deadline and every year, drama surrounding said deadline engulfs the news cycle. You’d think at some point they’d plan ahead and sort this business out well in advance of the deadline, but it’s much harder to lambast your opponent and score political points that way.
The deadline to fund the ever-growing federal government is Friday. Going into Thursday, it looked as though lawmakers were close to a deal.
Trump was using funding for his long-promised border wall as leverage, promising to support a legally codified solution to DACA (the extra-legal program created by President Obama that put Dreamers in indefinite legal limbo) in exchange for wall funding.
Also at issue is CHIP, the federally funded Children’s Health Insurance Program, which, with mere days of funding remaining unless Congress strikes a deal, has become a bargaining chip and a WHY DO YOU HATE THE CHILDREN rallying cry for Democrats and liberals.
Unable to come to an agreement on DACA, Republicans tossed CHIP onto the table as a way to lure Democrat support for a short-term funding resolution, giving everyone more time to hash out the DACA problem.
Then Thursday morning, Trump began tweeting, upending the entire discussion and confusing lawmakers who thought their negotiations were in line with the president’s goals.
First, Trump tweeted about The Great Southern Wall, reitierating again his stance on its importance, riling Democrats into a tizzy:
But it was his tweet about CHIP that left lawmakers confused:
Then Trump tweeted a shutdown would be disasterous:
Trump’s tweets almost tanked (according to our Hill betters) whatever Congressional negotiations were in the works. Following the tweets, the White House released a statement clarifying that Trump backs the short-term funding resolution meant to stave off a shutdown.
From Politico:
President Donald Trump is backing the short-term funding legislation being pushed by House Republican leaders, the White House said Thursday, just hours after the president caused confusion in the efforts to keep the government open.”The President supports the continuing resolution introduced in the House,” White House principal deputy press secretary Raj Shah said in a statement. “Congress needs to do its job and provide full funding of our troops and military with a two year budget caps deal. However, as the deal is negotiated, the President wants to ensure our military and national security are funded. He will not let it be held hostage by Democrats.”
And a memo from McConnell (reportedly) that was most certainly meant to be seen publicly:
This round of budget negotiations is almost identical to the 2014 fiasco that led to a government shutdown. The House Freedom Caucus caucused with Democrats when Republicans attempted to beef up border security.
Democrats say they have the votes to block the bill, even though GOPers suggest they’re confident they can sort this out:
If Congress is able to pass a short-term funding resolution, that deal will only fund the government until February 16 when we get to do the whole thing all over again.
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