American families are worried about losing food stamp benefits. Hundreds of thousands of federal government workers have no idea when they will next be paid. Several airports have been experiencing delays because of staffing shortages.
The pain of the government shutdown is growing more acute as it grinds toward the five-week mark, with Congress showing little movement toward a resolution. But President Trump has been attending to other matters.
Just hours after returning from a trip across Asia, Mr. Trump left Washington on Friday for a Halloween party and a fund-raiser at his Florida residence. When he weighed in briefly on the shutdown, it was to cast the potential loss of benefits that millions of Americans rely on for groceries as mostly a problem for Democratic voters. Rather than offer steps he might take to bring the crisis to a close, Mr. Trump called attention to the new details of his renovation of a White House bathroom.
“Highly polished, Statuary marble!” Mr. Trump declared on social media as he posted images of his new Lincoln bathroom, even as some households planned on handing out canned soup in lieu of candy.
The stark contrast crystallized how the president has appeared largely disconnected from the fiscal impasse that has gripped Washington and paralyzed much of the federal government.
In the weeks before the shutdown, Mr. Trump expressed confidence about the looming fight with Democrats. He said that he was certain Republicans could fund the government solely with their own votes and that they should not “even bother” negotiating with the other party.
As the stalemate nears the record for the longest shutdown in U.S. history — one set during Mr. Trump’s first term — he has continued to seem unbothered by the fallout, casting the log jam as one easily resolved.
“It’s their fault,” Mr. Trump said of Democrats as he traveled to Mar-a-Lago, his Florida club and estate, on Friday. “Everything is their fault. It’s so easily solved.”
“We’d like to see this taken care of rapidly,” Mr. Trump said, adding: “We have tremendous support, but it’s not even support, it’s common sense. Open up the country.”
The shutdown hinges on a fight in Congress over a short-term funding measure. Republicans want to pass one at current budget levels, while Democrats want to include additional money for health care programs and language that would limit Mr. Trump’s power to freeze funding.
Administration officials have expressed confidence that the public will blame Democrats for the standoff. But new polling this week found that more Americans blame Mr. Trump and Republicans. Among registered voters, 46 percent blamed Republicans while 37 percent blamed Democrats, according to a Washington Post-ABC News-Ipsos poll.
Mr. Trump offered one suggestion Thursday evening about how to get the government funded again, renewing his call to eliminate the filibuster to force through legislation that would end the shutdown. But his own party members who control the Senate have made clear they do not support such a measure, fearful that it would allow Democrats to pass a slew of liberal legislation if they retook the majority.
Instead, Republicans in Congress are beginning to call on Mr. Trump to get more involved in negotiating a compromise.
“He’s the leader of the band,” Senator Jim Justice, Republican of West Virginia, told reporters last week on Capitol Hill. “And we’re to the point in time now where we have an 18-carrot food fight going on. So at some point in time, the leader of the band is going to step up and guide us.”
The White House declined to answer questions about whether Mr. Trump would get more involved in the negotiations in the days ahead and what steps he would take to try to end the shutdown while at Mar-a-Lago over the weekend.
A White House spokeswoman, Abigail Jackson, said in a statement that Democrats needed to provide Republicans the votes to fund the government before any negotiations over their health care demands could begin.
“We will only have policy conversations once Democrats stop holding the American people hostage and reopen the government,” Ms. Jackson said.
But so far, Democrats have held firm, even as some labor unions representing federal workers have urged Congress to back the G.O.P. spending bill.
“You thought there would be enough division or cracks or pressure points that this would end, but it’s been remarkable that they’ve held solid,” said Matthew Bartlett, a Republican strategist.
“I think very unfortunately both parties are seeing pain and seeing polling, but they think it’s the other party that is hurting and not recognizing that it is the American public,” he added.
Republicans have argued that the unwillingness of Democrats to support current spending levels is leading to the potential loss of food stamp benefits for 42 million Americans.
However, Democrats have sought to put the blame on the G.O.P. for any disruption of benefits as the administration has refused to tap emergency funds to finance the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, even as the White House has used unorthodox maneuvers to ensure that members of the military and law enforcement get paid.
A federal judge on Friday afternoon ordered the Trump administration to continue paying the benefits, but it remained unclear when the aid would reach American households.
In a statement on social media, Mr. Trump said his “Government lawyers” did not think the administration could legally fund the program, adding that they were seeking clarity from the courts. He warned that any food stamp benefits paid in November would “unfortunately be delayed.”
In the early days of the shutdown, congressional Republicans had been privately cagey about the prospect of Mr. Trump negotiating directly with Democratic leaders, wanting to ensure he would not make any high-profile commitments that could disadvantage his party.
After Mr. Trump declared that he was willing to make “the right deal” with Democrats on health care, undermining Republicans’ stated position that they would not negotiate until the government reopened, he had to back away from the comments.
But Republicans concede that Mr. Trump will need to negotiate and ultimately support any measure to end the shutdown.
Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, said last week that he thought it was time for Democrats to negotiate with Mr. Trump directly.
“They ought to take him a proposal and make him an offer and say, ‘Here’s what we want,’” Mr. Hawley said. “He’ll presumably say, ‘Well, I can’t do that, but I can do this.’ It’s how negotiation works.”
Mr. Trump has said he is open to speaking with Democratic leaders about health care, but only after they help fund the government.
“People don’t get good health care and their premiums go up every single year. So we should change it,” Mr. Trump told reporters on Friday, before pivoting to his plans for the evening. “Tonight, we have a big celebration of Halloween, and I’ll see you later.”
Catie Edmondson contributed reporting.
Zolan Kanno-Youngs is a White House correspondent for The Times, covering President Trump and his administration.
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