Day 364: Trump Hamstrings Republicans Budget Strategy

Donald Trump seems to have been given excessive amounts of “Executive Time” Thursday morning, as he has ranted about a number of things on Twitter. It started with puffery about a southern border wall, before ending with a lie about the military being harmed if the government shuts down.

But in between those issues, he managed to totally undercut his Republican comrades with a tweet about the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).

Republicans, meanwhile, have been trying to throw CHIP into a short-term funding bill and force Democrats to make a decision: vote against CHIP — something important to most politicians on both sides of the aisle — or support the funding bill.

Just Wednesday his administration threw its support behind the short-term bill with CHIP thrown in, with the Office of Management and Budget saying in a statement:

The Administration supports the bill’s multiyear funding extension of the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP)… If H.J. Res. 125 were presented to the President in its current form, his advisors would recommend that he sign the bill into law.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), whose words and actions have vacillated between grossly sycophantic and openly hostile toward Trump over the past months, is currently ebbing toward the latter.

Other Republicans joined in voicing their frustration and confusion with Trump’s tweet.

Meanwhile, Trump continues his buck-passing by putting this on Democrats to fix.

The current strategy of the “great negotiator” is to destroy his own party’s position, then rely on the opposing political party try to pick up the pieces.

364 days in, 1098 to go

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