President Donald Trump is set to spend time in New York and London as the clock ticks toward a possible government shutdown, a break from the hands-on approach he used to help lock in the Republican-led tax and spending measure he signed on July 4.
After attending a New York Yankees baseball game Thursday night in the Bronx as he marked the 24th anniversary of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, the president is expected to spend the weekend in the Big Apple and at his New Jersey golf resort. After that: a three-day London trip, scheduled to begin Wednesday.
As he spends the weekend at his properties in Manhattan and Bedminster, N.J., there are scant legislative days remaining before government funding lapses on Sept. 30. Trump and congressional lawmakers are slated to become ships in the night next week, as he flies across the pond while they remain in session.
But then both chambers are scheduled to be on recess for the Rosh Hashana holiday the week of Sept. 22. And even if some remain in town to work on averting a government shutdown, Trump is expected to be in New York on Sept. 22 and 23 to address the United Nations General Assembly and huddle with world leaders.
The death and expected funeral service for conservative political activist Charlie Kirk, who lived in Arizona, will also pull the president away during spending talks. Trump started Friday with an in-studio interview with the “Fox & Friends” morning show, saying he planned to attend the service next week. (A specific date has not yet been set.)
His rhetoric in the wake of Kirk’s assassination could anger some Democrats as a stopgap deal is being sought.
For instance, though Trump on Thursday told reporters at the White House that he wanted people to respond to the killing in nonviolent ways, he also said: “I’m really concerned for our country. We have a great country. We have a group of radical left lunatics out there, just absolute lunatics. We’re gonna get that problem solved.”
His rhetoric about congressional Democrats on Friday could also complicate talks.
“We were going to do a, probably, continuing resolution or something, so we’re going to do something like that. Here’s the problem the Democrats have: They’re sick. There’s something wrong with them,” the 79-year-old Trump told Fox News, claiming 74-year-old Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., was “at the end of the rope, he’s going to be defeated in the next election.”
“If you gave them every dream, bring them every dream that they want to give away money to this and that and destroy the country,” Trump said of Democrats, “they would not vote for it.” About his White House staff working on a stopgap bill with lawmakers, the president said he advised them to not “even bother dealing” with Democrats, adding, “We will get it through.”
The upcoming schedule is vastly different to the approach Trump and his aides took over the spring and summer as Republicans negotiated his signature measure known as the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.
Back then, as it became clear that House and Senate GOP leaders would have the votes to send the massive bill — which Trump now wants to rebrand as a tax-cut measure — White House aides stressed the president’s involvement in twisting arms and securing votes.
A senior administration official told reporters on a July 3 conference call that he had “lost count” of the many meetings and phone calls Trump had with Republican lawmakers.
“The president was the … force behind the legislation,” the official said. “The president’s focus on relationships [with members] carried us through … when it became crunch time.”
But now, even with the government funding deadline approaching and the assassination of Kirk, to whom Trump says he was close, White House aides said Thursday there were no changes to the boss’s schedule through next week.
That could possibly complicate government funding talks with lawmakers — especially because Trump has yet to make clear what he wants from a stopgap spending measure.
For instance, a White House official was unable to say whether the president wants a continuing resolution into January or would be fine with a two-step approach beginning with a CR into November or December, and then a possibly broader package before the holiday recess.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, center, concludes a news conference Tuesday in the Capitol, along with Majority Whip John Barrasso, right, and Conference Vice Chair James Lankford. (Tom Williams/CQ Roll Call)
What’s more, Trump has been mum on whether he wants an upcoming spending measure to extend the Obama-era health care tax credits — which even some GOP lawmakers support.
Where Trump became something of a closer to Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., on the GOP tax and spending measure earlier this year, his coming focus on foreign policy could force GOP leaders into more arm-twisting duties on a stopgap bill.
‘Their base is clamoring’
And it became clear this week that differences between the two parties remain, with a likely need for votes from both sides to get a shutdown-averting bill to Trump’s desk by Sept. 30.
“In March, House Democrats strongly opposed the partisan Republican spending bill that hurt everyday Americans in a variety of ways, including making their health care more expensive,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., told reporters on Wednesday. “A continuing resolution that continues the failed policies of the Republican Party that we voted against is not the type of policy that actually meets the needs of the American people.”
Thune on Thursday told Punchbowl News that Democrats “see it as politically advantageous to have a shutdown,” adding: “I think their base is clamoring for that. They want a fight with the Trump administration. But they don’t have a good reason to do it. And I don’t intend to give them a good reason to do it.”
The president, a career businessman, frequently boasts about his deal-making prowess. A progressive watchdog group this week called for bipartisan negotiations to avoid what it contends would be illegal White House moves to refuse to spend congressionally allocated monies.
“It is essential that any deal created in this moment address the stark reality that since day one of the Trump Administration, we have seen an agenda to increase costs on everyday Americans in every way imaginable — including through illegal cuts via impoundments and rescissions — and healthcare is the clearest and most heart-wrenching example,” Lisa Gilbert, co-president of Public Citizen, said in a statement.
“If Republicans refuse to negotiate and move away from their cost-increasing agenda, then it is Republicans who will be forcing a government-wide shutdown,” Gilbert added. “There should be no deal without assurances that the budget will be honored and not impounded, and one that returns care to the American people.”
The coming funding deadline comes as one poll released this week showed Trump underwater among adult citizens on how he has been handling taxes and government spending.
More than half (56 percent) of respondents to a Sept. 5-8 Economist/YouGov survey said they disapproved of the president’s handling of those issues, while 37 percent approved. But that didn’t stop Trump from dropping one of his favorite lines about the health of the country during a 9/11 commemoration ceremony Thursday at the Pentagon.
“Last year, we were a dead country,” he said. “Now, we have the hottest country anywhere in the world.”