Under terms set forth by Mick Mulvaney, President Trump's budget chief, the
ruination of Obamacare is once again tied up with keeping the government
running. (photo: Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)
The White House Seems Excited to Shut Down the Government
By Ryan Lizza, The New Yorker
23 April 17
Next Saturday, April 29th, is President Trumps hundredth day in office, a
historical marker used by the press to assess a new Presidents progress
since the first term of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. F.D.R. was grappling with
the Great Depression, and he had a pliant Congress that would have passed
almost anything he proposed. Presidents since then have often struggled to
meet the expectations of the hundred-day report card but generally can point
to a list of major legislative accomplishments. Trump does not have such a
list. At the same time, the Trump White House is facing a much more
consequential deadline, one that will help define his first months in office
and perhaps his first term: absent a spending deal with Democrats and
Republicans in Congress, next Saturday the government will shut down.
While the potential for a government shutdown has been overshadowed by other
eventsSyria, North Korea, the attempted repeal of Obamacarethe Trump White
House is suddenly seized with the issue. Next week is going to have quite
high drama, a top White House official, who sounded excited by the coming
clash, told me. Its going to be action-packed. This one is not getting as
much attention, but, trust me, its going to be the battle of the titans.
And the great irony here is that the call for the government shutdown will
come onguess what?the hundredth day. If you pitched this in a studio, they
would say, Get out of here, its too ridiculous. This is going to be a big
one.
The last government shutdown was in October, 2013, and was widely blamed on
conservative Republicans in the House, with a major assist from Senator Ted
Cruz, who demanded that Obamacare had to be defunded, a ludicrous strategy
given that Barack Obama was President. Congress failed to pass the necessary
legislation, and the government closed for two weeks before Republicans came
back to the table. At the time, many predicted that the tactic would have
dire political consequences for the G.O.P., but the following year the Party
expanded its majority in the House and took over the Senate. Republican
leaders have prevented their right wing from forcing shutdowns in the years
since, but one lesson from 2013 is that the threat of a government shutdown
is a powerful way to press for concessions without paying too high a
political price.
In recent weeks, the prospect of a government shutdown seemed low. In the
House and Senate, Democratic and Republican appropriators, who, despite
ideological differences, are often united in their desire to spend money,
were making steady progress. But there was an elephant in the room. In
mid-March, the Trump Administration released a detailed spending request
that included a large increase for the military and for immigration
enforcement and massive cuts to domestic discretionary spending. While the
budget was released with fanfare, the White House seemed to retreat from the
talks, leaving congressional Democrats and Republicans to continue their
work without much guidance from Trump.
Yesterday, that changed. Mick Mulvaney, a Republican and former congressman
who was one of the House members who agitated for the 2013 shutdown and is
now Trumps budget director, announced that elections have consequences.
The consequence, it would seem, was a divisive proposal. Mulvaney suggested
that if Trump didnt get his defense spending and border wallwhich, it
should be noted, he promised would be paid for by Mexicothen the federal
payments, known as cost-sharing reduction subsidies, or C.S.R., that pay for
health insurance for millions of Americans under Obamacare had to be cut
from the spending bill. The ruination of Obamacare is once again tied up
with keeping the government running.
The funding legislation likely cant pass in the House without some
Democratic votes, and it certainly cant pass without Democratic votes in
the Senate, where Republicans need eight Democrats to reach the sixty-vote
threshold to prevent a filibuster. The two sides arent even close.
Theres a big spread between the bid and the ask here, the White House
official said, noting that Trump wanted thirty billion dollars for defense,
several billion for more ICE agents and the border wall, as well as eighteen
billion dollars in cuts to domestic spending and the ability to withhold
federal money from cities that dont coöperate with immigration officials.
The big priorities for Democrats are the money for those people who need
Obamacare subsidies, the protection of domestic spending, and increases for
programs for opioid addiction and health care for coal miners, the last two
being issues that Trump ostensibly campaigned on. These shouldnt be a big
deal, Democrats say, and they have accused the White House of throwing a
grenade into negotiations in order to wrest some sort of political victory
in the first hundred days. For weeks, the House and Senate Democrats and
Republicans have been working well together, a Democratic aide said. Then,
all of a sudden, the White House is looking at next week and they have
nothing to show for the first one hundred days, and they either want a
health-care bill to pass next week, which seems like a heavy lift, or to get
more on immigration from this process. Even Republicans dont want this
fight, and they dont want a shutdown on Day One Hundred of the Trump
Administration.
The White House, which is trying to force another vote on an Obamacare
repeal, seems desperate to either win some of Trumps priorities in a deal
next week, or force a government shutdown that it can blame on Democrats.
That might energize Trumps supporters, who dont have much to celebrate
yet.
But its not just the Democrats who oppose several Trump priorities.
Congressional Republicans, who are generally united in support for the
increase in defense spending, are divided on the border wall, which is not
popular among border-state Republicans, and the deep domestic-spending cuts.
So far, it does not look like a bridgeable gap. This is going to be
high-stakes poker, the White House official said. When I asked if a
shutdown was likely, the official paused for several seconds. I dont
know, the official said. The official added, I just want my wall and my
ICE agents.
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