President Trump has threatened to shut down the government if Congress refuses to fund a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. While establishment Republicans fret over the potential fallout, such a move offers only political upside for Trump and the GOP. Republicans should gleefully add a third three-letter chant to their present repertoire of “lock her up” and “build the wall”: “shut it down.”
Conventional wisdom holds that the public disproportionately blames Republicans for government shutdowns. The disproportionate election of Republicans to the U.S. Senate following the Republican-led shutdown of 2013 should have put that canard to rest. Voters reward Republicans for fulfilling campaign promises, and no promise more clearly defined President Trump’s winning campaign in 2016 than building the wall. Even beyond the policy’s popularity, the news cycle moves so fast these days that public rancor over particular issues simply cannot survive past the next tweet.
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