President Donald Trump assailed Democrats in a tweet earlier today and claimed, without offering any evidence, that "most of the people not getting paid" during the current government shutdown are Democrats.
This prompted many to make the same joke.
Others said the president's tweet implied he wanted the shutdown to target Democrats directly.
The president, who declined to sign a stopgap funding bill that would have prevented a government shutdown unless Congress allocate funds for his proposed wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, made the comment just a day after he claimed, also without offering any evidence, that “Many of those workers have said to me and communicated, ‘stay out until you get the funding for the wall.”
"These federal workers want the wall. The only one that doesn’t want the wall are the Democrats," the president added. I can’t tell you when the government is going to be open. It’s not going to be open until we have a wall, a fence, whatever they would like to call it. It’s a disgrace what’s happening in this country. But other than that, I wish everybody a merry Christmas.”
Yesterday, NBC News listed Trump's claim that portions of his proposed wall along the U.S.-Mexico border are being built even though construction on a new portion of the wall has not yet begun and won’t this year as the biggest lie he told in 2018.
The border wall––or lack thereof––remains Trump’s signature campaign pledge, but it’s not, contrary to what he may believe, a popular one.
According to a new NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll, 69 percent of Americans believe that the wall should not be a priority for Congress. 74 percent of Democrats say that the wall shouldn’t be a legislative priority at all. By contrast, 63 percent of Republicans described the wall as a “top priority.” 51 percent of independent voters said they don’t believe the wall should be a priority.
“With Democrats and Independents not connected with President Trump’s desire to build a border wall, it’s not surprising that they want him to compromise to avoid a government shutdown,” Lee M. Miringoff, Marist Institute for Public Opinion director, said in a press release. “On this issue, President Trump and the Republicans are on one side of the fence and Democrats and Independents are on the other.”
Among the poll’s other findings:
- 53 percent of Americans approve of the way President Trump’s administration has handled border protection, with 92 percent of Republicans and 26 percent of Americans expressing their support; independents, by contrast, are split (49 percent approve whereas 47 percent disapprove).
- 55 percent disapprove of the way the president is handling “irregular immigration on U.S. soil.”
- 54 percent disapprove of the way the president is handling efforts to reunite families separated by his administration’s “zero tolerance” family separations policy at the U.S.-Mexico border.
Trump's wall is "deeply rooted in xenophobia," says Rep.-elect Ilhan Omar (D-MN), who will be the first Somali refugee and the first Muslim-American female to wear a hijab in Congress.
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