Copyright independent
President Donald Trump moved quickly on Tuesday night to distance himself from a dire slate of election results for Republicans across the country and to demand his party finally end the government shutdown and “get back to passing legislation.” Democrats won the New York City mayoral race, as well as gubernatorial contests in New Jersey and Virginia. California passed a new redistricting plan to their advantage, with the results coming in as the federal blackout crossed into its 36th day, making it officially the longest in U.S. history, surpassing the 35-day outage during Trump’s first term in 2018/19. Hurrying to Truth Social, the president wrote: “‘TRUMP WASN’T ON THE BALLOT, AND SHUTDOWN, WERE THE TWO REASONS THAT REPUBLICANS LOST ELECTIONS TONIGHT,’ according to Pollsters.” He followed up with another post that read: “REPUBLICANS, TERMINATE THE FILIBUSTER! GET BACK TO PASSING LEGISLATION AND VOTER REFORM!” Trump has been urging the GOP to abolish the Senate filibuster, meaning a simple majority would be enough for the dominant party to pass legislation in the upper chamber of Congress —a step Republicans have been reluctant to take due to its longer-term ramifications. His party has so far refused to make any concessions to Democrats, who have declined to pass a new spending agreement without an extension of Covid-era healthcare subsidies being included. Without such a provision in place, the opposition has argued, insurance premiums for more than 20 million American citizens could more than double from $888 to $1,904 once the current subsidies expire on December 31. The impasse has seen Trump and the Republicans attempt to pin the blame for the shutdown squarely on the opposition, trolling and mocking their congressional leadership. At the same time, federal workers go unpaid, and public services are scaled back to a minimum. But Tuesday’s election results appear to suggest the strategy has backfired spectacularly, with voters coming out overwhelmingly against Republican candidates to express their displeasure and present Trump and the GOP with a clear warning ahead of next year’s midterms. Discussing a disastrous night for conservatives on Sean Hannity’s primetime Fox News show, two right-leaning pollsters were in no doubt about why it had come about. “Shutdown, shutdown, shutdown,” said Matt Towery. “That had a big effect on this election. We saw many Republicans start to go down as the weeks continued to go with the shutdown. Tomorrow, the legacy media is going to say it was Donald Trump. It’s not. It was the shutdown.” “The shutdown is everything,” agreed Robert Cahaly. “You’ve got so many people who depend on the government for either aid or a paycheck and when that is stopped they’re going to blame the party in power. And when the Republicans have the House, the Senate and the president, they don’t understand all the details of [the] filibuster – they understand the Republicans are in control and that check’s in jeopardy. “And so when that check is in jeopardy, when that aid is in jeopardy and whether it’s actually in jeopardy or whether they just perceive it’s in jeopardy, they’re going to vote their pocketbook even if they, ideologically, feel a little different way.” Prior to ballots being counted last night, talks between the two sides had intensified on Capitol Hill Tuesday, with Senate Majority Leader John Thune declaring in the chamber: “Enough is enough.” Issues like funding for SNAP benefits running out and Transport Secretary Sean Duffy warning of chaos in the skies without air traffic controllers getting paid appear to have finally brought matters to a head, with senators renewing their efforts to find a way to reopen the government, put the normal federal funding process back on track and find a means of addressing the expiring health insurance subsidies. However, Democrats emerged “stone-faced” from two hours of talks, according to the Associated Press, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer saying only: “We’re exploring all the options.”
