President Trump said this week that he was willing to shut down the federal government if Congress does not give him enough funds for his proposed wall on the Mexican-U.S. border. “If it’s about border security, I’m willing to do anything,” he told reporters after a meeting with congressional Republicans on Wednesday. However, on Tuesday, President Trump had said he did not like the idea of a shutdown. “I don’t see even myself or anybody else closing down the country right now.”
Government funding is set to lapse on September 30 and lawmakers have been scrambling since their return to Washington from the August recess to get a spending bill to the president’s desk. Appropriators have agreed to match the White House request of $1.6 billion in border wall funding, but President Trump has since significantly increased his request to $25 billion for the border project.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Paul Ryan has reportedly urged the president against doing anything to harm vulnerable Republicans so close to the November midterms. Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH), one of the founders of the Freedom Caucus, is urging GOP leaders to push for border wall funding now, before Congress leaves town for the elections. “Let’s get that done before the end of the fiscal year,” Jordan said. “No one wants a shutdown,” Jordan added, despite the fact that pushing for the wall money now would no doubt spur a shutdown fight given Democrats’ resistance.
Meanwhile, during a closed door House GOP Conference meeting Wednesday morning, Ryan and his team did not even mention the world “shutdown.” Instead, they laid out their plan to pass several minibus packages funding a number of agencies in clusters. They hope to get several of those signed into law before leaving for a mid-September recess.
House GOP leaders also encouraged lawmakers to stay focused and united on each of the bipartisan spending packages set to hit the House floor in the coming days, while brushing the shutdown matter under the rug for now.
House Republican rank and file appear to teeter between confidence that President Trump will postpone a shutdown fight until after Election Day, and concern that they may get a last-minute surprise tweet from President Trump regarding the border.
