NPR’s Ari Shapiro speaks with political commentators Jonathan Capehart of The Washington Post, and Mary Katharine Ham of CNN, about the border wall, government shutdown and the likelihood of President Trump declaring a national emergency.
ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
Well, as this shutdown approaches record length, we’re going to talk now about the politics of the standoff with our Friday analysts Mary Katharine Ham of CNN and Jonathan Capehart of The Washington Post. Thanks to you both for being here in the studio today.
JONATHAN CAPEHART: Thank you, Ari.
MARY KATHARINE HAM: Sure thing.
SHAPIRO: OK, so when the clock strikes midnight, this will be the longest shutdown in history. And all three of us have been in Washington for other government shutdowns, but this is the only one I’ve ever seen where as the days and weeks go by, the two sides don’t appear to get any closer together. So how do you each see this ending, Mary Katharine?
HAM: Well, I think the national emergency solution – and I’m making air quotes (laughter) – is what would end it quickly. But I think – here’s the problem – is that it’s sort of a copout for both parties. Democrats could say, hey, we didn’t give him any money for the wall, and Trump can say, hey, I got the wall. But it makes problem solving in the future so much harder. It’s genuinely bad for society. Executive overreach will not help them solve problems in the future, and they need to be able to do that. I think in the end – and this – I think this is why Trump is backing off it. I think he thinks he has an edge here and that they – Democrats may come down and just have to relinquish their point on a little bit of physical barrier.
SHAPIRO: Jonathan, do you see that happening, and how would it happen without any actual negotiations?
CAPEHART: Right. I see no end in sight. To your point, Ari, about being in this situation before, at least we knew that there were honest brokers on all sides and, despite the rhetoric coming out publicly, behind the scenes, they were all feverish – feverishly working to come to a solution but also working off the same set of facts. That’s not what’s happening here.
And so I think that as long as the president keeps saying that he wants a border – wants the border wall a – excuse me – a physical wall, that is going to be a problem for Democrats. If they are able to have a conversation about border security writ large, which Democrats are more than happy to have…
SHAPIRO: You’re talking about a package of measures…
CAPEHART: A package of…
SHAPIRO: …Including staffing and…
CAPEHART: Sure.
SHAPIRO: …Other – yeah.
CAPEHART: And when you talk to the – when you talk to people on the House side, they will tell you, you know, the first bill that Speaker Pelosi passed was the old Senate bill that passed unanimously in the old Congress which had money for the wall, other border security things but also something dealing with other immigration issues.
SHAPIRO: But it didn’t have all the money for the wall that President Trump wanted.
CAPEHART: Correct – not all the money that the president wanted, but it went down because the president at the last minute pulled the rug out from under it in the last Congress. That’s the impasse that we’re at here.
SHAPIRO: So I…
HAM: Well…
SHAPIRO: Mary Katharine, yeah.
HAM: Yeah, I mean, the reason that I think this is because if you look at the pure political calculus – and that’s – political pressure is what ends these things…
CAPEHART: Right.
HAM: …Donald Trump’s pressure point is not federal workers being out of their paychecks. It’s just not. I’m not taking a position on that morally, but that’s not his pressure point. It is a pressure point…
CAPEHART: Agreed.
HAM: …For Democrats. So if…
SHAPIRO: But we’ve also seen a few Republicans in Congress join Democrats in voting to reopen the government. Could those numbers grow as the shutdown stretches on?
HAM: They could. I do think Trump is pretty dug in on this. On – I do think they – he has to get some sort of physical barrier money in a package. I think a package could work, but there has to be some give on the physical part…
