Trump Temporarily Ended the Government Shutdown

Listen to this article

The U.S President Donald Trump is continuing to insist he did not “cave” to the Democrats by ending the government shutdown without funding for his border wall, in spite of a conservative backlash that has seen him a “wimp” and a “broken man”. Trump tweeted after ending the shutdown, “this was in no way a concession”. He was signaling that if he didn’t get a deal from Congress by February 15, he could shut the government down again or declare a national emergency to re-route federal money to fund the wall.

Trump now appears to have doubled down on this argument with a series of tweets confirming his belief that a wall is essential, and he will get it. He insisted on Saturday evening: “Only fools, or people with a political agenda, don’t want a Wall or Steel Barrier to protect our Country from Crime, Drugs, and Human Trafficking. It will happen – it always does”!

Only fools, or people with a political agenda, don’t want a Wall or Steel Barrier to protect our Country from Crime, Drugs and Human Trafficking. It will happen – it always does!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 26, 2019

The commentator Mike Cernovich has a large pro-Trump following. She said that the president was now “a broken man”. The influential conservative commentator Ann Coulter reacted to Trump ending the shutdown by insultingly invoking the memory of recently deceased former U.S president George HW Bush and said: “Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States”.

Coulter has previously said that Trump would be “dead in the water” if he didn’t get his wall. She also said that if he couldn’t build it, “Trump will just have been a joke presidency who scammed the American people, amused the populists for a while, but he’ll have no legacy whatsoever”.

Good news for George Herbert Walker Bush: As of today, he is no longer the biggest wimp ever to serve as President of the United States.

— Ann Coulter (@AnnCoulter) January 25, 2019

Conservative leader Mark Meckler helped found the Tea Party movement. He blamed Trump of having “brought his troops on the battlefield and then walked away”. Meckler called the president’s decision to sign off on a deal without wall funding “pathetic and disgusting”. He said that he and other conservative leaders had been aggressively defending the president’s hardline approach during the shutdown.

Don’t waver in your support of @realDonaldTrump – he is fighting , ALONE , daily to protect our country and to fulfill the promises from the campaign

I’m so sick of people from our side finding every excuse to attack the greatest president of our lifetime

We must have his back

— Charlie Kirk (@charliekirk11) January 25, 2019

The founder of the right-wing organization Turning Point USA, Charlie Kirk urged his Twitter followers: “Don’t waver in your support of Donald Trump. He is fighting, ALONE, daily to protect our country and to fulfill the promises from the campaign I’m so sick of people from our side finding every excuse to attack the greatest president of our lifetime. We must have his back”.