The president’s position is a non-starter with Democrats, making an end to the shutdown far from imminent

'He needs an out': Trump's demand for a wall has left him backed into a corner

Wednesday’s dramatic showdown between Donald Trump and Democratic leaders and the president’s defiant PR trip to the border the following day seemed to confirm observers’ fears: a breakthrough in negotiations to end one of the longest shutdowns in US history is far from imminent.

As key government operations remained shuttered for a 21st day and roughly 800,000 federal workers remained without pay, both the president and the Democrats have retreated into their own corners.

As far as Trump is concerned, any deal must fulfill his longstanding vow to build a wall across the southern border. The president has threatened to declare a national emergency over the situation at the border – a move he believes would allow him to circumvent Congress and begin the construction of a wall on his own – if lawmakers refuse to fund the project.

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The president’s position is a non-starter with Democrats, freshly in the House majority after the 2018 midterms. They have called for a government funding bill that essentially maintains spending at current levels, rebuffing Trump’s insistence on $5.7bn for a border wall.

Three weeks into the crisis, most Americans appear to be blaming Trump for the shutdown – further isolating the president with only his ardent supporters in favor of the White House strategy.

But there are few options that remain left at the president’s disposal, in part because the only true crisis was one of Trump’s own making.

Michael Steel, a former aide to ex-House speaker John Boehner, said Trump had backed himself and Republicans into a corner by insisting on a wall despite a bipartisan agreement in the Senate last month that would have punted a debate over immigration and border security until after a shutdown was first averted.

“Someone talks the president into an appallingly poor strategy based on a deeply flawed analysis that he would somehow have greater leverage in this debate if it were held in the context of a full or partial shutdown now,” Steel said.

Steel added that Trump’s public appeals this week, which the president himself was reluctant to give, were not going to earn Democratic votes “in any way, shape or form”.

Republicans in Congress have largely stood behind the president, although some cracks have emerged this week as lawmakers feel pressure from constituents back home to end the impasse.

Government shutdown: how bad is it and can it be resolved? Read more

A handful of moderate Senate Republicans – including Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Susan Collins of Maine and Cory Gardner of Colorado – have publicly broken with Trump and expressed support for a clean government funding bill. On Wednesday, eight House Republicans also bucked the president and joined with Democrats in voting for bills that would reopen the government without financing the wall.

“I continue to stress that there is no good reason for a shutdown,” Murkowski told reporters on Capitol Hill. “The reality is thousands of federal employees and contractors have no paycheck in sight, small businesses that rely on them are suffering and there’s no reason they should be held hostage to a political dispute.”

Murkowski personally raised the issue with Trump on Tuesday when he attended a closed-door lunch with Senate Republicans, telling the president constituents were feeling the “consequences” of the shutdown. Trump nonetheless dug in, urging unity from Republicans in response.

While the concept of a border wall is broadly popular with the president’s base, the proposal does not have the same traction with a majority of the American public.

Even so, Trump struck a defiant tone during his visit to the border town of McAllen, Texas, on Thursday.

The president again suggested criminals and terrorists are flowing freely across the border, ignoring that the rate of illegal immigration has fallen dramatically over the past decade, that the undocumented population in the US hit a 12-year low last year, and studies have shown that illegal immigration does not increase violent crime.

Trump said Thursday he was “definitely” prepared to declare a national emergency, despite warnings, even from conservatives, that such a move would amount to presidential overreach.

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A national emergency, however, might be Trump’s only way to emerge from the fight without having thrown in the towel, suggested Rory Cooper, a Republican strategist who served as an aide to the former House majority leader Eric Cantor.

“He gets the longest shutdown in history, which is a very Trump-like thing to want,” said Cooper, while adding: “I think the president looks at the base and says he fought harder than anyone, announces a national emergency, reopens the government and lets the courts deal with it,” he added.

“He just needs an out.”