Republicans may escape the brunt of the blame for the government shutdown, but only because they’ve been hiding on the sidelines while President Trump and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi duke it out.
According to several recent polls, most blame Trump and the Democrats for the current standoff that has left part of the government partially closed for four weeks.
And at least one survey that asks about the congressional GOP’s responsibility for the shutdown, independently of Trump, shows that the public might give them a pass this time.
A CBS News/YouGov poll conducted Jan. 9-11 questioned 1,470 adults about who they believe is responsible for the standoff and government closures. Only 3 percent blamed congressional Republicans.
A plurality blamed Trump (47 percent) and 30 percent blamed Democrats in the CBS/YouGov survey, while 20 percent blamed “all equally” for the mess.
“Polls show the bulk of the blame falls on Trump, and not Republicans in Congress,” Ron Faucheux, president of Clarus Research Group, a polling and research firm, told the Washington Examiner.
That poll and others show Republican lawmakers may finally be in a position to avoid blame, after years of bearing the brunt of every spending impasse.
The 2013 partial government closure left the GOP battered politically. Polls showed the GOP in Congress was found at fault over President Barack Obama by double-digit margins, and its favorability sunk to historic low levels.
The 2013 shutdown that lasted 16 days came after House Republicans initially refused to pass spending bills that did not defund Obamacare.
Most of the shutdown fights in recent years found the public was poised to blame the GOP if the government closed as a result.
The exception was 2017, when Democrats and Trump were blamed after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., blocked a spending bill over immigration reform, leading to a very brief government closure.
This time, Republicans in the House and Senate contend the shutdown fight is once again between Trump and the Democrats. They say there is little they can do until the two sides work out a deal.
For all practical purposes, the GOP is correct. Democrats took over the House majority in January, which means a funding deal has to win the support of Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who controls which bills come to the floor.
In the Senate, nothing can pass without Democratic support because Republicans control only 53 votes and 60 are needed to stop a filibuster.
President Trump is seeking about $5 billion for wall funding, and he has said he won’t sign spending bills without at least some of that money. But Democrats say they won’t agree to any wall funding.
“It’s between the president and the Democratic leadership,” Sen. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, said when asked about a path to end the shutdown.
But Faucheux warned that public opinion could sour on the GOP if they stay idle.
“At some point, voters will expect Republicans on the Hill to take the lead and break the logjam,” Faucheux said. “If they do it, it would help them in the end. If they don’t, they risk falling into the well with the White House.”
Many polls show Republicans are at risk of getting the blame when Trump and congressional Republicans are linked together.
A recent Quinnipiac University poll, for example, showed “Trump and Republicans in Congress” were blamed by 56 percent of those surveyed while 36 percent blamed Democrats.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has worked to publicly to delink the GOP from the mess and shift the responsibility to Democrats. McConnell says Democrats are refusing to negotiate and that he won’t take up the spending bills passed by House Democrats because Trump won’t sign them.
“I hope my Democratic colleagues will reverse course and work seriously with this White House to reach an agreement that can become law and fulfill our promises to the nation,” McConnell said this week.
Democrats, meanwhile, blame Trump and say McConnell could end the shutdown by taking up the House bills that could conceivably become law if there are enough votes to override a presidential veto.
A new Pew Research Center survey shows “widespread negative partisanship” when it comes to how the public views how Congress and the president have handled the shutdown.
In other words, Republican respondents (76 percent) are pretty happy with how Trump is handling the shutdown, while Democrats responding to the survey (71 percent) approve of their own party’s handling of the impasse.
Carroll Doherty, the director of political research at Pew, said the polling has shown a notable intensity of views among respondents, depending on party affiliation. That means there isn’t much support from either side for finding a compromise on the border wall and government funding, he said.
The latest Pew survey found public opinion about the border is more sharply divided along partisan lines than ever before. It found GOP backing for a wall at a record high and Democratic opposition to it at a record low.
“Clearly, it’s creating this more intense partisan environment,” Dougherty said.
