Within the Margin

A few days into this federal government shutdown, I began to write how actual public opinion is clashing with the political pundits’ conventional wisdom that Democrats would be blamed for a shutdown. I did not complete that piece immediately – but a week later, polling continues to show Trump and Republicans receiving more of the public’s anger. Let’s take a look at why that is, and why that matters.

The party withholding the votes to keep the government open usually “loses” in the court of public opinion, though the impact of these defeats is often over-stated: see the Ted Cruz-led 2013 shutdown, for which Republicans were blamed and condemned, and then their smashing victories a year later in the 2014 midterm elections. And the party withholding the votes to open the government eventually retreats, having gotten few if any concessions. That remains the likely outcome here as well, and Democratic Congressional leadership has acknowledged as much – while also noting that factional politics within the party demands that they show some fight after eight disjointed months of rather lax opposition since Trump’s inauguration. And so they’re showing it, demanding that the GOP extend Affordable Care Act subsidies whose disappearance will leave millions of Americans unable to afford the coverage they need, and millions of others paying higher premiums as insurers increase costs to make up for the lost customers. Morally, the Democratic position is sound. But there’s some risk here, given the historical pattern of shutdown politics, the Trump administration’s capacity to rebrand federal websites with Blame Democrats messaging (in violation of the Hatch Act, but that’s a dead letter at this point), their ability to make the pain real by shutting down popular parks and facilities, and the inherent contradiction with past Democratic inclinations to keep the government open.

Yet in poll after poll released since the shutdown began, the public blames the GOP right now. To be sure, they blame both parties in part – but the Republicans are getting more of it. Not overwhelmingly, but solidly and consistently. And perhaps that actually makes plenty of sense.

The reality is, Americans are not stupid. They understand who’s in charge in Washington. To the extent normal people have thought about it, they know that Republicans control both houses of Congress. And they know damn well who the president is. They know these things because the Republicans have made sure everyone knows they’re in charge. From the moment Trump’s re-election became apparent the night of November 5, they embarked on a victory lap designed to etch that victory into Americans’ minds as sweeping and historical – even though it was pretty narrow by historical standards. Or by recent standards: see Obama ’08 and Obama ’12. Conservative posters breathlessly tweeted about how “the culture is changing” with every new factoid about young voters or nonwhite voters shifting toward Trump, and with each fresh example of institutional capitulation on the part of media companies or universities.

And then came Liberation Day. The April 2 announcement of a national emergency stemming from the nation’s trade deficit and a series of broad and objectively incoherent tariffs to combat them, sent financial markets into turmoil. When that sort of thing happens, Americans lucky enough to have a retirement account begin to glance at them, and the turbulence that followed Liberation Day did those accounts no favors. And through it all, it was the Trump Show: whatever the merits of protectionist trade policies forty years ago and whatever their merits now, Trump has championed them the whole time. He announced them with his typical bluster and sent his minions to champion them on every news network to make damn sure Americans knew that Trump was in charge of trade policy.

Following Charlie Kirk’s death, Trump and his party – with a few notable exceptions, like Ted Cruz – made damn sure everyone knew they were watching what late-night comedians say, and that they can censor them if they choose. ABC got scared and suspended Jimmy Kimmel before public outcry provided the impetus to reset and put Kimmel back on the air. Amid the Kimmel controversy, public polling showed Trump support declining – and Kimmel’s viewership spiked when he returned to the airwaves (and streaming platforms, of course). Trump might not be in charge of late-night television, but he sure thinks he is. Attacking free speech may be a bridge too far in this country…and Americans knew who was escalating those attacks.

Viewed through that lens, it’s perhaps not surprising that people are going to blame government turmoil on the guys who go out of their way to make sure everyone knows they’re in charge. Public polling consistently shows that self-described independents are livid in general right now – over the cost of living in particular – so perhaps they’re not predisposed to take a positive view of a president who presents himself as an all-powerful, dealmaking force yet cannot keep the government up and running.

I suspect that as the stalemate goes on, the proportion of blame converges toward reflexive partisanship, and our most recent, comprehensive baselines for that is the 2024 presidential result. That would be closer, then, to a 50-50 split. But it’s also possible that views on the shutdown continue to adhere closer to Trump approval/disapproval lines, and that would leave Trump and his party solidly, though not overwhelmingly, underwater on the matter. As of this writing, the Silver Bulletin dashboard shows Trump at 44% approval and 52% disapproval.

While Trump’s ability to dominate news cycle after news cycle and create his own political weather often confounds Democrats, it is not without its risks for him and his party. If you spend each day flamboyantly reminding everyone who’s in charge, you can’t be surprised when you’re held responsible for events. Shutdown politics are proving to be a reminder of that so far, and this one has also created an opening for various Democrats to deploy some effective messaging. AOC and Bernie teamed up for a fun yet substantive walk-and-talk, and even Chuck Schumer managed to do some compelling work with this whiteboard video.

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It’s worth noting that one way this saga potentially ends is that Democrats let this pass with a simple majority rather than the 60 required to overcome the routine filibuster for appropriations bills, or Republicans change the Senate rules to eliminate it. Republicans have the votes to do either with ease, and the 60-vote requirement is not a constitutional or legal matter. It is simply a Senate rule. Both parties have enacted all kinds of exceptions to the 60-vote threshold; Republicans have already enacted some this year. It is inevitable that it will one day disappear entirely. When it does, America will lose this distortionary mechanism that creates a confusing gulf between electoral outcomes and policy outcomes. Governing parties will gain the responsibility to govern, and parties out of power will have to persuade the electorate to give them a chance instead.