The American people saw the nonsense Trump and his congressional Republicans engaged in over the last two years and they spoke up in the midterm elections. On January 3rd, Democrats became the adults in the room and took over the House of Representatives.
Already, less than a day after taking over The House, Democrats have passed multiple bills to re-open the US Government from its ongoing Trump Shutdown. Democrats have agreed with Republicans and passed bipartisan legislation to get over 800,000 federal workers back to work. But Trump refused to even consider ending his shutdown if he is not allowed to waste $5 billion on a wall whose only purpose would be to appease the wackadoodles in his base.
In the statement, the White House says Trump cannot support bills with “unnecessary funding for wasteful programs” unless he gets $5 billion for his pointless border wall. That supposed “unnecessary funding” Trump objects to includes support for the United Nations Population Fund, an international program that seeks to prevent violence against women, stop child marriage, and train health workers to “ensure at least 90 per cent of all childbirths are supervised by skilled attendants.”
But according to the Trump administration, that’s “unnecessary” and “wasteful.”
In addition, the Trump shutdown means the Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) has expired. “VAWA funds and administers numerous programs assisting survivors of domestic violence and sexual assault,” reports NPR, and payments for those programs cannot be made until Republicans decide to end the shutdown.
