President Donald Trump was prepared to sign a continuing resolution – without border wall funding – that’s been making its way through Congress this week. That was until right wing extremists on Fox News and Twitter blasted him overnight for “caving” on his demand of $5 billion to build his border wall. Among them, Ann Coulter, Rush Limbaugh, and Sean Hannity.
“Trump will just have been a joke presidency who scammed the American people, amused the populists for a while, but he’ll have no legacy whatsoever,” if Trump doesn’t get his $5 billion wall funding, Coulter said Wednesday.
Thursday morning, the House was ready to vote to pass the bill to keep the government up and running, and Speaker Ryan was ready to hold the final press conference of his career at 10 AM.
Then Trump turned the tables on the continuing resolution (CR) that would have kept the government open through early February, and placed an “emergency” call, pulling Ryan away from a meeting with his Republican caucus.
Moments later, after the call, Trump posted this vaguely threatening tweet:
Very quickly, Ryan canceled his press conference, without explanation.
The scheduled vote was postponed to later tonight, and a second House GOP meeting has now been scheduled.
Meanwhile, the Freedom Caucus, the extremist wing of the House GOP, has announced they will vote against the bill to keep the government up and running.
A noon meeting with House Republicans and the President at the White House was scheduled for noon.
Trump, via Sarah Huckabee Sanders, has just announced he “does not want to go further” on the continuing resolution “without border security, which includes steel slats or a wall.”
And no one knows if the government will shutdown for the holidays.
But chances that a shutdown will happen just escalated dramatically.
Which means many federal government workers would be furloughed over the holidays, and some forced to work, most without a paycheck.
Image by Darron Birgenheier via Flickr and a CC license