Although he once insisted that, during a government shutdown, problems “start from the top, and they have to get solved from the top,” Trump apparently feels that those words only apply to presidents named Obama. The man who insisted he knew government and politics better than anyone else, and that “he alone” knew how to fix the American government’s woes, is now holed up in the White House sulking and trying to blame Democrats for his own failure of leadership on negotiations for passing a simple budget resolution.
Has there ever been a greater flip in the script than Trump’s second tweet of Monday morning? There is no “far left base” holding Democrats hostage on DACA. In fact, 86 percent of American voters (all American voters, not just Democratic voters) support extending protections for DACA recipients. The remaining 14 percent of voters are the GOP’s far right, who even some Republican lawmakers are accusing of holding up the budget negotiations.
Sen. Lindsay Graham (R-SC) admitted over the weekend that the holdup in budget negotiations has not been caused by Democrats in the Senate; instead, it is the endless pushback by the poster boys for the GOP’s far left, Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AZ) and Trump’s senior policy advisor, Stephen Miller. Speaking to reporters from Capitol Hill, Graham pointed directly at Miller for his hardline stance on immigration as the cause of the government shutdown.
‘Every time we have a proposal, it is only yanked back by staff members. As long as Stephen Miller is in charge of negotiating on immigration, we are going nowhere.’
The full quote from 2013, according to Newsweek, was:
‘Problems start from the top, and they have to get solved from the top, and the President’s the leader, and he’s got to get everybody in a room, and he’s got to lead. And he doesn’t do that, he doesn’t like doing that, that’s not his strength. And that’s why you have this horrible situation going on in Washington. It’s a very, very bad thing and it’s very embarrassing worldwide.’
Perhaps Trump should take his own advice and start working to own and end the shutdown rather than throw petulant baby fits from his bedroom at the White House while watching Fox News. Start from the top, Trump, and end this racist madness on immigration.
Twitter responded to Trump’s ridiculous tweets. See some of their responses below:
Featured image via Getty/Mandel Ngan
