As if it wasn't enough that day after day there is more news about the sluggish, bombastic and spontaneous agenda put forward by the Trump administration, the month of April will bring an end to Donald Trump's first 100 days as president. At the same time, it seems that there's also some effort by the administration to bring about a government shutdown and make a big impression as some form of accomplishment. This makes sense since much of Donald Trump's political career relies on unexpected twists and turns that while horrific, also bring very little hope or any guarantee that his office will function appropriately.
So it makes sense that an official from the Trump White House is actually looking forward to a government shutdown. In an article published in the New Yorker titled: "The White House Seems Excited to Shut Down the Government", it quotes the official as saying that the end of the week is going to be a "clash of the titans" and "action packed." While the article continues to refer to the person they spoke with as a "White House official," they could very well have been speaking to Trump as the official made promises much like the President does of how much of a cliffhanger it could be.
Shutdown instigator Mick Mulvaney instigates
And it isn't as if the White House is watching Congress from the sidelines without somehow trying to make the shutdown happen because Trump's budget director Mick Mulvaney appears to be instigating the shutdown as he did with some Republicans, including Ted Cruz, in 2013.
With one government shutdown under his belt, what's another? At the time, Cruz was the main instigator who took credit for the shutdown that lasted for two weeks before "order" was restored again. And it was over Obamacare at the time, which is making a return for the potential shutdown to come
Over the past several months since Donald Trump became president, Blasting News reported on the Republicans' failure to repeal Obamacare -- and article which blamed Trump, and when he released a budget proposal from "alpha-male heaven" that Republicans sniffed at, saying that they would come up with their own budget, which Blasting News also mentioned.
The New Yorker article points to the fact that Republicans had moved on and ignored that budget. But Mulvany has apparently decided to try and force Congress to accept the President's budget, saying that cost-sharing reduction subsidies for Obamacare needed to be cut from the spending bill and the money used for their agenda.
Congress responds
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer's spokesman responded to Mulvaney's demands saying that they would not hold health care hostage so that taxpayers can foot the bill for one of the President's budgetary demands. One of those demands being Trump's border wall. The spokesman, Matt House, said that the most Democrats and many Republicans do not support the building of the border wall and are against the administration's "eleventh hour" demands on Congress.
There's a sense that without the White House inserting itself and trying to bully legislatures, that Republicans and Democrats can negotiate a budget deal by themselves. It's noted that Republicans would need to drop the "poison pill" amendments such as the border wall from the budget in order to get Democratic support.
Mulvaney, however, seems to reluctantly acknowledge that any Democrats have to be brought to the table in order to prevent a government shutdown, but added that "elections have consequences." It's likely that this does exert some pressure on the lawmakers since they have been on Easter recess for two weeks and will be returning to a week where they will face an aggressive Trump administration.
