geeky
Perhaps one of the strongest examples of the tension between the Executive and Legislative branches of government during the current administration occurred in the events leading up to and during the federal government shutdown of 2018–2019. The shutdown began at midnight EST on December 22, 2018, and lasted until January 25, 2019. It was the longest U.S. government shutdown in history, and the second federal government shutdown during the Trump presidency. The 115th United States Congress and the President could not agree on an appropriations bill to fund the operations of the federal government for the 2019 fiscal year. As a result, federal departments and agencies were prevented from conducting non-essential operations until appropriations legislation was in place. Nine executive departments with around 800,000 employees were forced to shut down partially or in full, affecting about one-fourth of government activities. Many government employees were furloughed or required to work without being paid. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the shutdown cost the American economy at least $11 billion.
The shutdown was the result of an impasse over President Trump's demand for $5.7 billion in federal funds for a U.S.–Mexico border wall. In December 2018, the Republican-controlled Senate unanimously passed an appropriations bill without wall funding. The bill appeared to be on its way to being approved by the Republican-controlled House of Representatives. But after the President faced heavy criticism from many right-wing media outlets and pundits for appearing to back down on his campaign promise to "build the wall", he announced that he would not sign any appropriations bill that did not fund construction of such a wall. The House passed a stopgap bill which included funding for the wall, but it was blocked in the Senate.
In January 2019, representatives elected in the November 2018 mid-term elections took office, giving the Democrats a majority in the House of Representatives. The House immediately voted to approve the appropriations bill that had previously passed the Senate unanimously (which did not include funding for the wall). President Trump remained firm that he would veto any bill that did not fund an entire border wall. Republican Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked the Senate from considering any appropriations legislation that Trump would not support, including the bill that had previously passed. Democrats and some Republicans opposed the shutdown and passed multiple bills to reopen the government,.
On January 25, 2019, President Trump agreed to endorse a stopgap bill to reopen the government for three weeks up until February 15 to allow for negotiations to take place to approve an appropriations bill that both parties could agree on, but he reiterated his demand for border wall funding. He threatened to shut down the government again or declare a national emergency and use military funding to build the wall if Congress did not appropriate the funds by February 15.
President Trump was losing the battle in the eyes of the public. A CBS News poll found that 71% of Americans considered the border wall "not worth the shutdown". A poll by The Washington Post and ABC News found that 53% of Americans blamed President Trump and the Republicans for the shutdown, compared to 34% who blamed Democrats and 10% who blamed both parties.
A bipartisan group reached agreement on a budget deal "in principle" on February 11, which included was $1.375 billion for 55 miles of steel border fencing. Both houses passed the bill February 14 with enough votes to override a veto if that happened. On February 15, at the White House Rose Garden, President Trump announced that he had signed the spending bill to keep the government open. He also declared a national emergency, hoping to get access to $8 billion to use for border security.
But there is nothing unprecedented about Presidents not getting along with Congress. John Tyler, the 10th President of the United States and the first to assume office after his predecessor died, frequently clashed with the majority Whig Party, the party on whose ticket he was elected, first over his status and then later when Tyler vetoed bills aiming to create a new national bank. The angry Whigs in Congress first kicked Tyler out of the party and then started an impeachment process, the first time it was initiated. The resolution failed and Tyler was unable to pass anything significant from his domestic agenda, though he did manage to orchestrate Texas annexation.
President Franklin Pierce torpedoed his chances to be renominated as his party's candidate for re-election as President after he supported the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The controversial legislation repealed the ban on slavery in Kansas, established Kansas and Nebraska as territories, and gave the right for white inhabitants, not Congress, to decide whether they would allow slavery. Opposition in Congress was fierce and led to the formation of the Republican Party. Violence in Kansas between pro- and anti-slavery supporter broke out, leading to a period often referred to as “Bleeding Kansas.”
James Buchanan saw seven Southern states seceded from the Union near the end of his time in office. His relationship with Congress began deteriorating when he expressed support for Kansas joining the Union as a slave state. In 1858, one year into Buchanan’s term, Republicans gained control of Congress, blocking many of his proposals, and in return, he vetoed many of their bills.
Andrew Johnson and Congress did not get along right from the start of his presidency, which followed Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. Congressmen did not like Johnson’s Reconstruction plans and they overrode his veto on laws concerning former slaves. To Johnson's consternation Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which established former slaves as citizens and banned discrimination against them. Congress impeached Johnson in 1868 for violating the Tenure of Office Act after he tried to fire Secretary of War Edwin Stanton, who also opposed the president’s Reconstruction plans.
Perhaps one of the strongest attack by a President against Congress was made by President Harry Truman in 1948 as he battled to win election to the Presidency on his own merit in an election everyone expected him to lose. Trailing in the polls, Truman decided to adopt a slashing, no-holds-barred campaign in which he scornfully targeted the Republican-controlled 80th Congress with a wave of blistering partisan assaults. Truman told audiences, "the Communists are rooting for a GOP victory because they know it would bring on another Great Depression." In several speeches, Truman stated that "GOP" actually stood for "gluttons of privilege", and called Republicans "bloodsuckers with offices on Wall Street." He told one audience that "The Republicans have begun to nail the American consumer to the wall with spikes of greed." At the National Plowing Contest in Dexter, Iowa, Truman told 80,000 farmers in attendance that "this Republican Congress has already stuck a pitchfork in the farmer's back." He nicknamed the Republican-controlled Congress as the "do-nothing Congress". When his opponent Thomas Dewey rarely refused to respond to the attack, adopting a strategy of appearing to be above petty partisan politics, the electoral tide shifted in Truman's direction.
It is not unprecedented for a President to battle with Congress constantly, though it is an unwise one for any President hoping to get his legislative agenda passed. In these times of intense polarization however, it is hard to imagine that much will change in future.