A lot of conservatives with big platforms were very, very angry at Trump this week.
If the government shuts down tonight over President Donald Trump’s demand for $5 billion for a border wall, feel free to blame conservative punditry.
This week Ann Coulter described Trump as a gutless “sociopath” who, without a border wall, “will just have been a joke presidency who scammed the American people.”
Radio host Rush Limbaugh said on his show Wednesday that without the $5 billion, any signing of a budget stop gap would show “Trump gets nothing and the Democrats get everything.”
Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy said that without wall funding, “the swamp wins,” adding that Trump will “look like a loser” without wall funding and stating, “This is worth shutting down” the government.
There’s no way around it: A lot of people on the right are very upset with Trump (and each other) right now. And they’re taking it out on the president — on his favorite television network, on talk radio, on podcasts, and online — and it’s worked to put the pressure on him. Trump has abruptly changed course to demand $5 billion for a border wall (a demand the Senate isn’t likely to give in to). And now the government is facing a “very long” shutdown.
In the words of Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), referring to Coulter and Limbaugh, “We have two talk-radio show hosts who basically influenced the president, and we’re in a shutdown mode. It’s just—that’s tyranny, isn’t it?”
.. Republican voters are still solidly behind Trump (his approval rating among Republicans polled by Gallup is at 86 percent). But unlike some portions of Trump’s base, the voices of the party who supported Trump because of what he could do as president rather than who he is as president are deeply displeased with him.
Some on the right are upset about the administration’s decision to pull out of Syria and, perhaps, Afghanistan — and are very worried by news of James Mattis’s resignation from his role as defense secretary.
Forget about a border wall – Trump and Congress should agree on these immigration policies that work
But let’s get real: There are already more than 650 miles of barriers on our southern border. Building a wall would not address needs such as: more robust training for the Border Patrol; new infrastructure and additional personnel at ports of entry; physical barriers where they make sense at key locations along the border; and a border policy that strengthens commerce and our nation’s economic competitiveness.
The truth is that far from there being a crisis on our border, unauthorized immigration is actually down 13 percent from its peak in 2007.
Instead of demanding his wall, President Trump should demand that Congress provide the Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Office of Field Operations – which oversees immigration and commerce at the country’s 328 ports of entry – with funds for more staffing.
CBP is short at least 1,100 officers at ports of entry, the Government Accountability Office reported earlier this year.
A wall won’t halt the flow of illegal drugs at ports of entry. Despite what the president tweets, CBP statistics show that 81 percent of hard drugs intercepted along the southwest border between 2012 and 2016 were seized at ports of entry.
Last year, CBP seized 118,021 pounds of cocaine, heroin, meth and fentanyl at ports of entry, compared with 20,000 pounds seized between ports.
In other words: you can build a wall to the sky, but it won’t stop drugs from getting into our communities.
Senate Voting on Proceeding With House-Passed Spending Bill
Move comes after president says a government shutdown is likely
Spending bills need 60 votes to clear procedural hurdles in the Senate, where Republicans hold a 51-49 edge.
Later Friday morning, the president encouraged Mr. McConnell to change the rules of the Senate to enable spending bills to pass with a simple majority instead of the 60 votes required to clear procedural hurdles.
“Mitch, use the Nuclear Option and get it done! Our Country is counting on you!” Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter.
A Shutdown Over Something
Legalizing Dreamers for border money would be worth the effort.
The country is yawning as Washington wrangles over another possible government shutdown this weekend, and no wonder. The fight is over a difference of merely $3.4 billion in funding for border security. If Donald Trump really wants a political fight worth having, and a chance to retrieve his public standing, he’d go much bigger and offer legalization for the Dreamers in return for his money.
At this late stage such a trade isn’t likely. Republicans who lost in November want to get out of town, and Democrats figure they’ll be in a stronger position in January when they run the House. We are left with one of those shutdown spectacles in which the rhetoric is so bitter because the stakes are so small.
.. Another possibility is to pass a continuing resolution through the new year and delay the fight until the next Congress convenes. The gambit is that the politics will be cleaner for Republicans when they can blame Democrats who will then be running the House. Yet President Trump is even less likely to prevail on border funding next year without making even larger concessions.
All of which is a reminder of Mr. Trump’s immigration lost opportunity. With his restrictionist campaign credentials, he was perfectly positioned to strike a deal that settled at least some of our immigration dilemmas.
He had leverage with Democrats on the Dreamers
.. The GOP “compromise” bill in June had $23 billion for border security, but it lost in a rout when Mr. Trump offered only diffident support. Mr. Trump was given bad advice by White House aide Stephen Miller and cable-TV scolds that immigration would be the GOP’s killer issue in the fall.
It killed Republicans all right. The summer brought the family separation fiasco, and no amount of last-minute campaign hype about the caravan from Central America could save Republicans in the suburbs. As Minnesota Rep. Erik Paulsen told us early last year, an immigration deal would have given him another accomplishment to tout and removed a vote-mobilizer for Democrats. Mr. Paulsen was among the 30 or so House GOP incumbents who lost.
..If Democrats aren’t willing to offer more border security in exchange for a deal on the Dreamers, something the party has made a signature issue, then that will expose the left’s political cynicism... Mr. Trump is in far more re-election trouble than he realizes. He has alienated suburban Republicans with the crude way he behaves, and the many legal and political investigations won’t stop until he has left office, if then. He needs to change voter perceptions. A deal on immigration would show he can solve problems that other Presidents couldn’t.