“The shake-up” right before Christmas in American politics

The incident is not unusual in the "Land of the Stars and Stripes", but this time it happened at the end of the year when American politics is going through "chaotic" days.

At noon on Saturday, December 22 (Vietnam time), the US government partially shut down due to lack of operating funds. Photo: Getty

The old man broke the rope.

At noon on Saturday, December 22 (Vietnam time), the US government partially shut down due to lack of operating funds. Thus, from now until then, many US government departments and agencies, including the departments of Homeland Security, Transportation, Interior, Agriculture, Foreign Affairs or Justice... will have to accept the situation of having no money to operate, negatively affecting the work and life of about 800,000 federal employees during the year-end holidays.

About 420,000 employees serving in key areas such as security will still have to go to work without any salary while the rest will "play long" and of course without salary.

This is the third US government shutdown this year, following a three-day shutdown in January and a brief shutdown in February. But this time, the situation seems more tense.

Although discussions are still ongoing, according to observers in the US, it may not be until after Christmas that the parties reach an agreement on the budget issue.

The main reason why Capitol Hill could not pass a temporary budget bill to keep the federal government operating until February 2019 was due to disagreement between the White House and lawmakers over the budget of more than 5 billion USD to build the wall on the US-Mexico border.

The House of Representatives previously passed the budget, but the Senate rejected it because Democrats strongly opposed the construction of a wall that President Donald Trump said would help prevent illegal immigration to the United States.

Visitors cannot visit the Christmas tree near the White House due to the partial government shutdown. Photo: Reuters

For his part, the White House boss has insisted that he will not approve the budget if the temporary spending bill does not include this funding. Mr. Trump has even openly supported shutting down the government for months until money is available to build the border wall.

It can be said that the story of the Mexican border has divided the US Congress for a long time, since Mr. Trump took office. And this conflict has led to a partial shutdown of the US government, once again showing the uncompromising attitude of US President Donald Trump towards the issue he considers the number 1 priority of his term.

“The old rope will break”! The uncompromising confrontation in American politics between the President and Democratic congressmen will become more complicated when budget negotiations continue in the first days of the new year 2019.

What are the consequences?

In fact, government shutdowns are no longer a strange thing to the American people. Since 1981, the United States has experienced 13 government shutdowns, and this shutdown under the Trump administration is the 14th. Many Americans have therefore become indifferent and unconcerned.

After all, the federal government is shut down but state governments are still operating, and social services seem to be largely undisturbed.

However, in economic terms, each such crisis usually causes billions of dollars in damage to the US economy. Specifically, according to estimates, the US economy will suffer a loss of about 6.5 billion USD if the government is shut down for just one week.

Politically, the temporary government shutdown continues to deepen the deep-rooted conflicts and confrontations in American politics and is a bad sign for cooperation in the US Congress next year - when the Democrats will be more aggressive when they take control of the House of Representatives.

For President Donald Trump personally, the incident has more or less caused him to "lose points" domestically, especially since this is the first year in decades that the US government has had to shut down 3 times in 1 year.

The current state of American politics has shown that it is difficult for any bill or solution to pass smoothly without compromise between both sides. However, at present, the Democratic Party has repeatedly stated that it will not accept funding for a wall on the border with Mexico.

“It is a shame that the president, who is leading the country into chaos, continues to throw tantrums and affect innocent people. Trump's tantrums will not get him the border wall."

Senator Chuck Schumer, Democratic leader in the US Senate.

Meanwhile, President Trump also does not want to give up his intention because two years after his pledge at the time of taking office, the "wall" has not yet come true.

And to get the votes of voters in the 2020 election, Mr. Trump needs to fulfill his commitments.

Such a context shows that the upcoming negotiations on the budget issue will be extremely difficult and complicated, not excluding the possibility that US politics will face a new "storm".

Notably, this "budget war" is like a "shakedown" taking place in the context of US politics being in a chaotic period, as some US congressmen said.

Last week, President Trump abruptly announced a troop withdrawal from Syria. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis resigned in protest, and other officials are expected to follow suit.

Defense Secretary Jim Mattis resigned because he disagreed with President Donald Trump's decision to withdraw troops from Syria. Photo: AP

Not only that, the stock and financial markets are gloomy, US stock prices have had their "worst" trading week of the year... amid investors' concerns about slower economic growth and the Federal Reserve's expected continued interest rate hikes next year as well as the US-China trade war with no end in sight...

Clearly, what happened in the last days of 2018 seemed to recreate the image of a divided America, with many risks and political crises that could come at any time - things that have happened throughout the past year.

This not only paints a gloomy picture for the United States in 2019, with many unpredictable developments, but also erodes the prestige and image of a superpower to the outside world./.

Thanh Huyen