Acrimony deepens after government shutdown's first day
Day
one of the government shutdown ended with recriminations between the
parties deepening and no sign of progress towards ending the impasse.
The
White House, Republican and Democratic leaders spent most of Saturday
apportioning blame and flexing partisan muscles after the Democrats
blocked a Senate bill to fund the government and the federal machine ran
dry on cash at midnight on Friday.
While
both the House and Senate were in session Saturday, there was little
sign of an opening, as leaders who will eventually have to talk to one
another to resolve the showdown stayed in their corners.
"Everyone's dug in. No movement at all from either side," said a Democratic aide.
President
Donald Trump had been hoping to be the star of the show at a glitzy
fundraiser at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida Saturday celebrating the
anniversary of his inauguration. But he was forced to stay in
Washington.
"There
shouldn't be a shutdown, but there is," Trump said in a video recorded
for showing at the event, according to a person who saw the footage.
"It's caused by the Democrats. But we're gonna end up winning another
victory."
But
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer pinned the blame directly on the
President, implying that he was falling well short of his "Art of the
Deal" reputation and was being led astray by hardline White House aides,
Hill Republicans and conservative media.
"Negotiating
with this White House is like negotiating with Jell-O, it is next to
impossible," Schumer told reporters. "The President needs to pull up a
chair to end this shutdown."
Republican
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell warned "the solution is to end
the foolishness. It's hurting millions of Americans who have done
absolutely nothing to deserve this."
By
the end of the night, McConnell warned that the Senate would vote on a
three-week stopgap spending measure at 1 a.m. Monday unless Democrats
agreed to move up the vote.
Most of
the energy on both sides Saturday was devoted to key players branding
the impasse either the "Trump shutdown" or the" Schumer shutdown." And
for all the posturing, sources told CNN that Schumer and McConnell had
not spoken since their interactions on the Senate floor in the dramatic
early moments of Saturday. A Democratic source said there had been no
conversations between the top Democrat and anyone in the White House on
Saturday. Both sides appeared to be waiting for the other to make the
first move.
Republicans are resolute: No talks on DACA, the expiring Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program,
until Democrats give them enough votes to reopen the government.
Democrats, meanwhile, say they have to have an answer on extending
protection to nearly 700,000 people brought to the US illegally as
children who face deportation after early March.
"It
is kind of hard to understand. When you're holding our troops hostage
and essentially denying services to law-abiding Americans and denying
funding to our border agents, how you can negotiate on DACA during
that?" Marc Short, the White House legislative affairs director asked.
"I think the administration's position is that as soon as they reopen
the government, we'll resume negotiations on DACA, but it's hard to
negotiate on that while they're keeping our border agents unpaid,
keeping our troops unpaid, and not paying for American services."
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