Earlier this week GOP senate leaders and President Trump agreed to a spending bill to keep the federal government running until February. Then the pundits on Fox News got involved.
The government will go into partial shutdown at midnight after the GOP-controlled Congress severely undermined Trump’s drive for a border wall, instead embracing a short-term spending bill that would have kept the government open, but deny any new money for his long-promised wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.
The Senate declined to even vote on a short-term spending package containing $5 billion of wall funding that the House passed Thursday, knowing it could not get the 60 votes needed.
Trump’s sudden refusal to sign anything without wall funding has thrown Congress into a tailspin with just days before Christmas.
With no clear direction on what Trump would be willing to sign, Congressional leaders are essentially going back to the drawing board.
The agreement announced Wednesday by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) would have funded the federal government through Feb. 8th, and Trump appeared to be agreeable just days before Christmas.
But then conservatives and Fox News pundits started demanding a shutdown, knowing Trump was listening.
“We have two talk-radio show hosts who basically influenced the president, and we’re in a shutdown mode,” said Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), referring to Ann Coulter and Rush Limbaugh. “It’s just—that’s tyranny, isn’t it?”
This week Coulter described Trump as a gutless “sociopath” who, without a border wall, “will just have been a joke presidency who scammed the American people.”
Trump promptly unfollowed Coulter on Twitter, but clearly he was listening.
Radio host Rush Limbaugh said on his show that without the $5 billion, any signing of a budget stop gap would show “Trump gets nothing and the Democrats get everything.”
Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy said that without wall funding, “the swamp wins,” adding that Trump will “look like a loser” without wall funding and stating, “This is worth shutting down” the government.
Right-wing outlets, including Breitbart and the Drudge Report, also attacked the deal, accusing Trump of caving on the core promise of his campaign.
Conservatives were complaining on Trump’s favorite television network, on talk radio, on podcasts, and online — and it worked.
Trump has abruptly changed course to demand $5 billion for a border wall (a demand the Senate isn’t likely to give in to).
And now the government is facing a “very long” shutdown.
Just 11 days ago Trump said he would “proudly” take responsibility for the shutdown.
But now he’s back to blaming the Democrats, who take control of the House in less than two weeks.