OPINION:
Democrats are pretending to be tough guys, but they’re not very good at it. They closed the federal government at midnight Tuesday, lest the public realize just how enfeebled their party has become. The left’s faithful allies, about 1 million nonessential federal government employees, will pay the price.
“We can do things during the shutdown that are irreversible,” President Trump warned on the eve of a last-ditch Senate attempt to avert the cessation of unimportant federal functions.
Lacking the ability to think ahead, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer sabotaged the good-faith Republican effort to maintain the status quo while both sides tended to the ever-tardy appropriations measures.
A clean continuing resolution cleared the House two weeks ago, but Mr. Schumer controls the seven votes required to pass anything consequential in his chamber. He is misusing this advantage to demand the $1.5 trillion in spending needed to return noncitizens and goldbricks to the Obamacare rolls.
House Speaker Mike Johnson observed that Mr. Schumer seems more worried about Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a fellow New York Democrat, than his own constituents.
“He’s running from AOC and the socialist base of the party who are going to challenge him at the next election,” the Louisiana Republican said on CNBC. “They say he didn’t fight Trump when he did the right thing back in March and did a temporary funding measure, and now he’s got to fight.”
Leftists scream about the Department of Government Efficiency’s “devastating” cuts, but the modest reductions barely made a dent. Without a restoration of the traditional impoundment power, the president could do little to overcome the torrent of waste.
According to the latest Congressional Budget Office assessment, overall expenditures went up $310 billion, or 5%, this fiscal year. Of course, this measurement unfairly includes the three months President Biden’s staff was busy “tossing gold bars off the Titanic.”
On top of that, a $319 billion increase in outlays happened on autopilot. Interest payments on our $37.5 trillion debt jumped by $72 billion. The Social Security Ponzi scheme spilled $111 billion in additional red ink. Medicare consumed $64 billion extra. Medicaid climbed by $47 billion, and Obamacare costs soared $25 billion.
Congressional obstructionists would accelerate Uncle Sam’s inevitable bankruptcy, and even the Gray Lady is sounding the alarm. A New York Times/Siena poll released Tuesday found that 65% of respondents believed Democrats shouldn’t shut down the government “if their demands are not met.”
That’s a reversal from the usual way shutdowns play out. A bare plurality of Democrats endorse Mr. Schumer’s strategy, and he is up against a powerful Republican countermessage.
“Democrats are about to shutdown the government because they demand we fund healthcare for illegal aliens,” Vice President J.D. Vance summarized on X.
Earlier this month, Russell Vought, Mr. Trump’s budget chief, circulated a memo exploring a permanent termination of government programs once they “are no longer statutorily required to be carried out.”
This would achieve Mr. Vought’s goal of rightsizing the federal leviathan while bypassing the roadblocks set up by Democratic appointees to the federal bench. The administration’s priorities, including border security, were already funded in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
That means Mr. Vought is free to deem counterproductive projects and agencies as “nonessential,” eliminating anyone who works on them through reduction in force notices.
Liberals will regret their lapse in judgment as their most cherished initiatives are shut down for good.
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