Republicans are having trouble realizing that "as the heads of the government, they actually [have] to do something beyond angrily shaking their fists at the world," Salon's Matthew Sheffield has pointed out. That's a lesson that may come too late for GOP, as a government shutdown is looming.
A shutdown is "more likely than not," Axios reported on Monday, pointing to April 29 as the day that the government will cease its routine functions after the last continuing resolution on funding expires. The last time the government shut down was in 2013, an event that lasted for two weeks. But that shutdown was a political maneuver, designed by Republicans who vehemently opposed former President Barack Obama's immigration policies. But this isn't 2013, and the Republicans aren't against anything. They just have an inability to govern.
"There are some folks in the Republican House caucus who have yet to make the pivot from complaining to governing," Republican pollster Whit Ayres recently told the Associated Press. "And this is a White House controlled by a politician who is not really trying to lead a party."
The Republican congressional leadership is so desperate that it's starting to consider approaching moderate Democrats and the Congressional Black Caucus — a group that President Donald Trump singled out during a press conference last month — because the ultraconservative coalition known as the House Freedom Caucus is unlikely to work with the party to pass anything. That message was repeated by Rep. Ted Poe, R- Texas, who announced on Sunday he was stepping down as a member of the House Freedom Caucus.
"Saying no is easy, leading is hard, but that is what we were elected to do," Poe said in a statement. "Leaving this caucus will allow me to be a more effective member of Congress and advocate for the people of Texas. It is time to lead."
Trump has a lot of work to do to have the government functions properly. The anticipated date of a shutdown would be the president's 100th day in office.
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