Schumer: Trump Suggests Shutdown Could Last 'Months or Even Years'
Source: New York Times
Emerging from what they called a “sometimes contentious” meeting at the White House, Democratic leaders said Mr. Trump remained adamant that he would not sign spending bills to reopen the shuttered offices unless Congress approved money for his wall on the southern border.
“We told the president we needed the government open,” Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic leader, told reporters outside the White House. “He resisted. In fact, he said he’d keep the government closed for a very long period of time, months or even years.”
. . . .
Mr. McConnell has refused to take up the House package, insisting that he will not bring anything to the floor that Mr. Trump will not sign. Democrats intend to argue in the meeting that Mr. McConnell should at the least pass the cluster of appropriations bills, while continuing to negotiate over border security. In their last meeting, Mr. Trump rejected that idea, telling the group, “I would look foolish if I did that.”
Mr. McConnell, meanwhile, is waiting for guidance from Mr. Trump. He has absented himself from the talks, insisting that it is up to Democrats to resolve the impasse. But he is beginning to face pressure from vulnerable Republicans who are worried about their re-election prospects in 2020.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/us/politics/democrats-trump-meeting-government-shutdown.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
= new reply since forum marked as read
Lawrence Lessig Fri 4 Jan 2019 06.00 EST
No reading of our constitution would ever uphold the view that a president can stop the functioning of government, to insist upon a program unsupported by the public
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jan/04/trumps-wall-is-constitutionally-illegitimate
(snips)
The president ran on a promise to build a wall “paid for by Mexico”. No majority of Americans has ever voted to support that idea. But that idea is not the notion that is now shutting down the government. A wall paid for by taxpayers is. That wall certainly was a central issue in the 2018 midterm elections. Overwhelmingly, the public rejected it as well. Thus has the president earned public support for neither version of his Mexican wall. Yet he is using his veto power to demand that Americans pay for a wall before he will allow the government to reopen.
The American constitution does not contemplate such presidential unilateralism, at least unsupported by the public’s will or the constitution. Perhaps the most salient historical parallel is President Andrew Johnson’s insistence that he had the constitutional right to control (and effectively stop) reconstruction after the civil war. Like Trump, Johnson insisted on his power; like Trump, he campaigned across the country to rally the nation to his view; like Trump, his view was overwhelmingly rejected at the polls; like Trump, nevertheless, he persisted – until a Congress, exhausted by his recalcitrance, impeached him and came within a single vote of conviction.
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. . . Trump strengthened his rhetoric in his demands for more than $5 billion to build a wall along the southern border, saying it must be built out of concrete or steel. Democrats have rejected providing any new funding for a border wall. “The southern border is a dangerous horrible disaster,” Trump said. And contrary to Democrats’ demands, he said the government would stay shut down until the issue was resolved. . .
Questioned about how the 800,000 federal workers now on furlough or working without guaranteed pay would cope without a safety net, Trump said: “The safety net is going to be having a strong border because we’re going to be safe.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/pence-urges-gop-lawmakers-to-stand-with-trump-in-shutdown-fight/2019/01/04/99519d06-103f-11e9-84fc-d58c33d6c8c7_story.html?utm_term=.e001a7873d7a
