Senate Republicans are willing to die on this hill wall despite years of having complete control of Congress and doing nothing to make it happen. Now, the plan appears to be to continue to hold federal workers hostage until the president gets his way and can hook his Xbox up to the big TV in the living room.
According to the Hill, Democratic Sens. Chris Van Hollen (Md.) and Ben Cardin (Md.) asked for consent to look at a package of bills that would’ve effectively reopened the government, which is currently in its longest shutdown in American history.
From The Hill:
One bill would fund the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 8, while the other would fund the rest of the impacted departments and agencies through Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year.
Under Senate rules, any senator can ask for consent to vote on or pass a bill, but any senator can object. McConnell blocked the two bills, saying the Senate wouldn’t “participate in something that doesn’t lead to an outcome.”
McConnell for weeks has said he would not bring legislation to the floor on the shutdown unless there was a deal between President Trump and Democrats on border security, the issue that has triggered the shutdown. McConnell has described other votes as “show votes.”
“The solution to this is a negotiation between the one person in the country who can sign something into law, the president of the United States, and our Democratic colleagues,” McConnell said Tuesday.
McConnell is a gang member and his gang is the GOP. When his rivals, the leather jacket-wearing, finger-snapping Democrats were in control, McConnell did everything he could to stop them.
Never forget that it was McConnell who said this in 2016:
“One of my proudest moments was when I told Obama, ‘You will not fill this Supreme Court vacancy.’”
But when his khaki-wearing, tiki torch-toting gang was ready to nominate a Supreme Court justice in 2017, he changed his tune to this: “Apparently there’s yet a new standard now, which is not to confirm a Supreme Court nominee at all. I think that’s something the American people simply will not tolerate.”
So yeah, McConnell has always been and will continue to be trash.
Almost a quarter of the government has been shut down since Dec. 22 over the border wall that was supposed to be paid for by Mexico but has now become a pet project of the president in his imaginary fight against a problem that doesn’t exist.
Basically, the president believes that his Don Snow and his work is to keep America safe from the Whitewalkers.
Also from The Hill:
The Senate passed a stopgap bill late last year by a voice vote, but it was rejected by the White House because it didn’t include extra border money.
Trump is demanding more than $5 billion for his signature wall. Democratic leadership has pointed to $1.3 billion as their cap and argued that it must go to fencing.
House Democrats passed their package to fully reopen the government earlier this month and have begun passing individual appropriations bills as they try to ratchet up pressure on Republicans to break with the president and support the legislation. But those bills are expected to go nowhere in the GOP-led Senate.
McConnell is comfortable hiding behind the president and allowing the shutdown to continue, and it’s only hurting the American people. As it stands, a wall is being built between commonsense voters and deplorables.