In the midst of a looming government shutdown, GOP lawmakers are scrambling to find the votes to pass a short-term spending bill before a deadline of Friday at midnight.
With less than 48 hours before a possible shutdown, President Trump upended the process by throwing a barrage of early-morning tweets into the mix indicating his disagreement with his cabinet. This included a rebuttal to Chief of Staff John Kelly’s recent comments that Trump’s long-championed border wall and views on immigration have “evolved” as the president has become “very, very flexible in terms of what is within the realm of the possible.”
“The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it,” Trump tweeted Thursday morning. “The Wall will be paid for, directly or indirectly, or through longer term reimbursement, by Mexico.”
The Wall is the Wall, it has never changed or evolved from the first day I conceived of it. Parts will be, of necessity, see through and it was never intended to be built in areas where there is natural protection such as mountains, wastelands or tough rivers or water.....— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2018
....The Wall will be paid for, directly or indirectly, or through longer term reimbursement, by Mexico, which has a ridiculous $71 billion dollar trade surplus with the U.S. The $20 billion dollar Wall is "peanuts" compared to what Mexico makes from the U.S. NAFTA is a bad joke!— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 18, 2018
Trump also tweeted about the Children’s Health Insurance Program, or CHIP, saying that it "should be part of a long term solution, not a 30 Day, or short term, extension!" The program is another issue for which the GOP has attempted to reach across the line to come up with a bipartisan solution in the hope of extending the government shutdown deadline by one more month.
With a divided GOP, will Democrats vote for a short-term bill, even if it doesn’t include a hard-line DACA fix or a key re-authorization of CHIP?
According to Rep. Michael Capuano (D-Mass), Democratic strategies may not matter if Republicans can get enough votes to push the bill down the road one more month.
“There are all kinds of strategies being discussed,” Capuano told Boston Public Radio Thursday. “Some Democrats won’t vote for it no matter what, some will try to make a deal, and it may not be a deal that’s necessary if they come with a majority of Republicans that are willing to do it.”
Even if a DACA immigration bill is eventually included in the final legislation, Capuano said he has some reservations about other major issues.
“The DACA issue is critically important, obviously to hundreds of thousands of people, and I think it’s also important, as far as I’m concerned, to what kind of country we want to live in,” Capuano said. “It is not, however, the only issue. It has gotten the lion’s share of the attention, but there are also all kinds of funding issues here, on health care, on housing, [and] on roads.”
“For me, you add DACA on top of it, it probably means it’s likely that I’ll vote no,” Capuano continued, “but of course I won’t make that decision until we actually see the bill that we have.”
Trump’s tweets hardly inspire confidence that the president supports the House stop-gap bill, which Capuano said leaves legislators confused about how to vote.
“That’s the biggest problem I have with this administration, other than basic policy, is that we don’t know where they’re coming from,” Capuano said. “They speak with a thousand different tongues … they change on a dime, and to me — when you’re negotiating anything — trust, I think, is the most critical aspect.”
In a press conference late Thursday morning, House Speaker Paul Ryan told reporters the president “fully supports” the House plan to avoid government shutdown. “I am sure where he stands,” Ryan said. “He fully supports passing this legislation. I just talked to him an hour and a half ago.”
