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NYTimes
New York Times
20 Dec 2024
Maggie Haberman


NextImg:How Trump Used Government Shutdowns as Leverage During His First Presidency

In 2018, during Donald J. Trump’s first presidency, he said he would be “proud” to shut down the government if a deal was not reached that included funding he wanted for his proposed wall along the southern U.S. border.

“I’ll be the one to shut it down,” Mr. Trump said at the time. “I will take the mantle. And I will shut it down for border security.”

The partial government shutdown that followed was the longest in U.S. history. Mr. Trump was surprised at how poorly people reacted to it, according to one official who worked in the administration said.

As a midnight deadline drew closer on Friday,the incoming president both suggested he could live with a shutdown and tried to push the blame for it on President Biden, who will be in office for another four weeks.

“President-elect Trump is doing more to find a resolution for the American people than the sitting president,” said Karoline Leavitt, Mr. Trump’s incoming White House press secretary, in a statement. “If the government shuts down, the onus is on Joe Biden, who has been hiding away since Election Day.”

Mr. Trump has pushed for shutdowns consistently over time, primarily as a leverage tool. Some advisers in his first term told him that there were ways to minimize the pain that taxpayers experience in a shutdown — a message that apparently has stuck with him.


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