White House Looks to Chip Away at Democrats’ Resolve as Record Shutdown Rolls On
Trump considers inviting rank-and-file Democrats frustrated by length of impasse
Now the White House is targeting a group of moderate Democrats who, the president’s aides believe, have expressed some openness toward a border wall.
Officials said they have been tracking statements made by rank-and-file Democrats about the wall, particularly by freshmen members serving in districts that Mr. Trump won in 2016.
As the week began, they were considering inviting some of these Democratic lawmakers in for a meeting to negotiate a possible deal, in what would be a test of Democratic unity and the leadership’s grip on the caucus.
.. One senior White House official said: “Increasingly, rank-and-file Democrats…are speaking positively about a physical barrier on the southern border as part of a package of reforms” that would include new technology and additional immigration judges. The official didn’t identify which Democrats the White House might attempt to pick off.
Prying Democrats away from the party’s leadership won’t be easy, lawmakers and aides from both sides said.
“They’re stuck. This is probably the fifth attempt to dig themselves out of a hole,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D., Hawaii) said of the White House effort’s to negotiate with rank-and-file Democrats.
Mr. Schatz said he suspected the administration was discovering what Democrats learned when they shut the government down last year in an effort to secure protections for young immigrants. “When you tag your cause to a shutdown, that cause becomes less popular,” he said.
Still, the strategy could put political pressure on House Democrats who represent conservative districts, by inviting them to the White House and putting them on the spot about the border wall, one Democratic aide said.