Once Again, Trump Is Demanding House Republicans Shut Down The Government To Sow Despair And Chaos

As always, Trump wants chaos and dysfunction, certain that turmoil will help him in November. And when it comes to shutting down the government right before the election, not all Republican congressional incumbents feel the same way. Many are trying to get Trump to back off, although some of the extremists in blood red districts where a winning coalition doesn’t include independents or swing voters, think bout it the same way Trump does.

Yesterday, Sarah Ferris, Jordain Carney and Olivia Beavers reported that even the House schlemiels who who usually too cowardly to defy Trump are “rebuffing his demands to shut down the government if they don’t get a partisan immigration bill. Trump wanted to use the issue as a cudgel in the final throes of his presidential campaign as he calls the security of elections into question— an echo of his false claims that Democrats stole the 2020 election.” Even MAGA Mike is trying to talk him out of it.

“[M]ultiple GOP lawmakers,” they wrote, “have communicated that to Trump, saying a government shutdown wouldn’t be good for his campaign, either… [MAGA Mike] hasn’t announced his next move, but in the coming days he and his GOP leadership team are expected to officially defy Trump’s wishes to play hardball with congressional Democrats. The two parties are now in formal talks on a mostly drama-free spending bill that punts the major policy fights until after the election, including a Trump-backed measure that would require proof of citizenship to vote. Lawmakers want to release details over the weekend, with a vote early next week. And part of [MAGA Mike’s] reasoning, according to a half-dozen lawmakers and senior aides close to him, comes down to November: [MAGA Mike] is defending nearly two dozen seats in blue-leaning turf— and some of those members privately warned [MAGA Mike] that a government shutdown meant they could lose their seats. [MAGA Mike’s] fate as GOP leader is closely tied to his ability to hold onto the GOP majority.”

[MAGA Mike] has personally spoken with Trump about the spending fight, including a meeting on Thursday night. And while he won’t say if Trump is on board with the speaker’s strategy to avoid a late September showdown, [MAGA Mike] suggested that Trump understands that the GOP voting bill can’t pass.

“I’ve had a lot of conversations with President Trump, and I won’t divulge all of that, but he understands the situation that we’re in, and he is doggedly determined to ensure that election security remains a top priority, and I am as well,” [MAGA Mike] said.

Even some of Trump’s close allies in Congress believe he should keep his focus on winning the presidency and not get dragged into an internal House spending fight.

“President Trump, in my view, is rightly focused on running for president. It is the job of members of the House to do the job that the House is here to do,” said Rep. Byron Donalds (R-FL), who has spoken to Trump about government funding. “And I think that we need to… figure that out amongst ourselves. The President, he’s right to be focused on his campaign, because there’s a lot of stuff that has to happen over the next 50 days.”

And it’s not just appropriators who have been making the case to Trump world directly. Leadership-aligned lawmakers have been telegraphing to the former president’s team in recent weeks that a spending deal with Democrats this fall would help clear the decks if he wins in November, according to a Republican familiar with the discussions. Those Republicans must compete against a small core of Freedom Caucus members and others on the right flank like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA), who is trying to sway him in the opposite direction.

But even Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a Freedom Caucus member and close Trump ally, indicated he thought that the president’s focus should be on winning in November.

“I think everyone knows where the president is at. We need to make sure he’s our next president. So the president’s got a campaign to run,” Jordan said, asked if he thought Trump needed to be weighing in more directly with members on the funding fight.

House GOP leaders initially attempted to force Democrats into a negotiation over the Trump-backed immigration measure, but Johnson was forced to abandon the plan after a group of his own members tanked the package. Nearly a dozen GOP lawmakers publicly opposed the plan, and dozens more were grumbling about it privately, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

That left [MAGA Mike] without any leverage to negotiate with the Democratic-controlled Senate and President Joe Biden.

Now, [MAGA Mike] will move ahead with a bipartisan spending plan that many senior Republicans have been encouraging him to adopt for several weeks. In a private meeting last week, a group of House GOP spending leaders told Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-OK) that he should encourage [MAGA Mike] to proceed with a “clean” stopgap instead, according to three people familiar with the discussions.

“Look, even though I wish it wasn’t the case, there is a U.S. Senate. And a White House,” said Rep. Mario Diaz-Balart (R-FL). “You’re going to have to negotiate.”

But Trump’s involvement in the final 10 days before the Sept. 30 shutdown deadline remains a wildcard for many House Republicans. Some privately worry that if he keeps pushing for a March deadline it could complicate the likelihood of avoiding a shutdown— if not now, then at the end of the year.

“The idea is just to get it done, get us the space and time we need, let the elections play out and go from there,” Cole said.

Almost certain to be swept away if House Republicans force a government shutdown would be these 15 Republicans, vaguely in this order:

• Anthony D’Esposito (R-NY)

• Brandon Williams (R-NY)

• Lori Chavez-DeRemer (R-OR)

• David Valadao (R-CA)

• Mike Garcia (R-CA)

• Ken Calvert (R-CA)

• Don Bacon (R-NE)

• Tom Kean (R-NJ)

• Mike Lawler (R-NY)

• Michelle Steel (R-CA)

• John James (R-MI)

• Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA)

• John Duarte (R-CA)

• Marc Molinaro (R-NY)

• Maria Salazar (R-FL)