Quote:
Originally Posted by weeeez
I've got a few questions about the shutdown as I'm not familiar with it.
1-was the shutdown voted or the president alone declared it?
2-does it need to be a special set of reasons/circumstances to declare a shutdown? (i.e or can you declare a shutdown whenever opposition vote no?)
3-if no reasons for shutdown needed why have votes at all?
4-who decides when the shutdown ends?
5-why this shutdown law exists?seems really weird.
I'll try to answer these all, but it will make more sense if I don't go in order or answer each one individually.
How shutdowns happen: the main job of Congress is to appropriate funds for the government. The biggest way they do this is by passing an annual budget. When they pass it, the president must sign it. Often, when things are functioning properly, this process starts with the president proposing various things for the budget - perhaps even a full budget proposal, which Congress then considers/adjusts/votes on. If Congress fails to pass a budget and/or the president fails to sign it on time, we go into a shutdown. Often times these negotiations go up to the final hour, or we have a 2-3 day shutdown (which more or less doesn't matter, as long as it doesn't include a payday or paycheck processing day). Often when there is disagreement, everyone will agree on a continuing resolution (CR). This funds the government at the same levels as the prior year, sometimes with minor adjustments and sometimes with other things tacked on. When people talk of a clean CR, they are talking about a totally clean continuing resolution that simply funds the government at the prior year's levels for a set period of time.
How this shutdown happened: Last year, before Dems took over the House, there was a deal in place between Senate Republicans and Dems (needed to break the filibuster), House Republicans and Trump. The understanding was that everyone would sign off on a clean CR and Trump would sign it. The clean CR passed the Senate 100-0, and Trump then declared he would no longer sign it unless there was wall funding. He had been told by right wing talk show hosts that he'd lose his base if he didn't fight for the wall, so he did. As a result, the House (under Republicans and Paul Ryan) decided not to vote for it and we entered a shutdown. Since then, Dems have taken control of the House and passed a clean CR. However, because it's a new session of Congress, the bill must go through the Senate again (where it already passed 100-0). Unfortunately, Mitch McConnell is now toeing the line with Trump and won't bring it up for a vote. So, the shutdown continues.
How this shutdown will end: Either Trump caves and allows the Republicans to stop standing in line behind him and agrees to re-open the government without his wall funding, Democrats cave and give him his wall money, or something unprecedented - like it goes on so long that eventually the GOP turns on Trump and a veto-proof bill passes that he can't block.
Politically, it's very complicated. Democrats know that if they cave, they will incentivize Trump's hostage taking and be subjected to it again in the future. He's shown a tendency to do this, most notably with DACA. So if they cave on this, they're basically caving on him getting all of his biggest partisan priorities. Meanwhile, they're not getting blamed for the shutdown, so they have little reason to cave.
Trump knows that if he caves, he could lose his base. He also gets other fringe benefits out of this shutdown, like the FBI being hindered in its investigations and a news story that overshadows anything related to Russia on most days.
Senate Republicans know that if they cave and betray Trump, they'll lose Trump's base and could be primaried in their next election.
Most people are blaming Trump and/or the Senate Republicans (McConnell), and typically whoever gets blamed for a shutdown caves... but given the way their base feels, they are more scared of caving and losing their base than holding on and being blamed by the other 60-65% of Americans.
I think that should answer everything, but feel free to ask more questions. Sometimes people here can be a little harsh toward newcomers, and often questions are asked in bad faith. You seem to be genuinely curious, and I think you'll find that people are pretty helpful/welcoming as long as that continues to be the case. We've got a good group here with a ton of intelligent minds, so it's a great place to learn more about politics.