Aside from praising convicted criminal Joe Arpaio and failing to even mention the military service members dead after the recent USS John S. McCain collision, Donald Trump used last night’s chaotic Phoenix rally to promise a government shutdown if Congress doesn’t pay for his immoral border wall that he has already admitted was just a way to get his racist base riled up. “If we have to close down that government,” Trump said, “we are going to build that wall.” Right. Never mind the fact that private lands, tribal lands, mountains, rivers, deserts, wildlife preserves, and reality make a wall along the entirety of the border next to impossible—but what’s a fact these days, anyway? Apparently, “Mexico will pay for the wall!” is out, and “I will shut down the government if Congress doesn’t pay for the wall” is in:
Trump has told his advisers he will not accept a deal on other issues without money for the wall “and it has to be real money,” said one senior White House official.
Trump has told senior White House officials and advisers he would be willing to go to whatever means necessary to get money for the wall, a contentious claim even among his advisers.
He hasn’t identified specific amounts of money that he wants, but he seeks “enough to really start building it,” said one person who spoke to him last weekend.
It’s really interesting to note how forcefully these unnamed White House officials are coming out to support the wall in the midst of chaotic White House exits, legislative failures, spats with the Senate majority leader, and the fact that, you know, the president of the United States basically embraced white supremacists and Nazis from a domestic terror attack. But, Trump can also expect some pushback from Paul Ryan, who said that “I don’t think a government shutdown is necessary, and I don’t think most people want to see a government shutdown, ourselves included.” It’s safe to say a portion of Trump’s base would probably love to see a shutdown—that is, until it starts affecting any sort of benefits they received through the U.S. government. And that’ll all be on Republicans.