A president should NOT have the ability to arbitrarily shut down the government!

[MoonRiver]

Is this in the constitution? If not, on what legal basis is this done?

[UniteFightBack]

1. A fake president only gets to do this when he has accomplices in the Senate or the House. nt

[MoonRiver]

2. It shouldn't be allowed.

Innocent people are punished for nothing they did.

[Claritie Pixie]

3. He doesn't. The GOP could open the gov tomorrow, could have opened it weeks ago.

Veto-proof bill would do it. It's their fault.

[MoonRiver]

4. I know, but the A-HOLE shouldn't have the ability to do it anyway.

[manor321]

5. The Congress can fund govt any way they wish, overriding the president

The problem is the Republican party.

[Turbineguy]

6. He was elected to run the country as a CEO.

CEO's shut down their companies all the time.

Don't they?

[DetroitLegalBeagle]

7. The President doesn't have that power

The President can veto budget and spending bills, but Congress can override them if they wanted.

[MoonRiver]

10. Well, didn't Chumpy shut down the government on his own?

I ASSUME he has this power.

[DetroitLegalBeagle]

13. No

Congress has the power to pass a spending bill and reopen the government without Trump's approval, if they wanted. The problem is doing so requires 2/3rds of both the House and Senate to vote to override the Presidents veto. Its questionable whether there are enough GOP votes in the house to vote with the Dem majority to override, and its near impossible in the Senate with McConnell refusing to bring any bill to the Senate floor, as well as the difficulty of getting 20 GOP Senators to vote to override.

[D_Master81]

8. Technically

The big misnomer in all of this is that its Trump vs. House Dems when technically the GOP could keep the government open by passing a bill and overriding a veto. But in this era of Trump lapdogs in the GOP they follow his orders.

[Grasswire2]

9. McConnell is the obstruction.

The votes exist to open government.

He refuses to allow the vote.

And so when Dems are accused of obstruction, that's false.

[onenote]

11. Legal basis? Congress has to pass and the president has to sign legislation to fund the government

And if that doesn't happen the government shuts down. It is, for example, what happened in 1995 when Bill Clinton vetoed a funding measure passed by the Republicans in Congress.

[MoonRiver]

12. Thanks. That explanation has probably answered my question.

[Mariana]

14. He doesn't, and he hasn't.

If both houses of Congress pass a bill, he can veto it, but Congress can override his veto. This is not on him alone. All of the Representatives and Senators who won't vote to end it (i.e. the Republicans) are just as responsible as he is.