538: "The Shutdown Didn't Change Anything, But It Did Teach Us Some Stuff"
by Perry Bacon Jr
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-shutdown-didnt-change-anything-but-it-did-teach-us-some-stuff/
The government shutdown appears to be over. It will have lasted less than one full weekday. Congressional Republicans and President Trump probably “won,” in the sense that the Senate approved a government funding bill that did not include any kind of policy along the lines of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, the Democrats’ primary demand. But the government is only funded through Feb. 8. So nothing is really resolved.
But let’s take a closer look at what (if anything) the shutdown changed:
On policy
GOP leaders in the Senate essentially agreed to hold a vote on immigration policy before Feb. 8. That isn’t nothing, since it wasn’t clear before the shutdown that there would ever be such a vote. But Republican leaders have not committed to what kind of bill will be considered. It could be a DACA replacement. Or it could be something else.
And no matter what happens in the Senate, everyone already knew that getting a DACA-like bill through the upper chamber was the easy part of this process. A bipartisan group of senators has already unveiled a bill that would offer legal status and a path to citizenship for DACA recipients, add some new funding for border security and apply immigration limits favored by conservatives. (Although, it’s not clear that legislation has 60 votes.)
If the Senate manages to pass that bill, or another like it, the real hurdle will be — and always has been — the House. So, here are the two big questions: First, is there a bill that at least some Senate Democrats will like that can also pass the House, where Speaker Paul Ryan is likely to insist that any bill have the support of a majority of House Republicans? (Remember, GOP members in the House are generally more conservative than their Senate counterparts.) And second, what kind of bill would Trump actually sign that would also have backing from Senate Democrats?
snip - much more at the link above
= new reply since forum marked as read
A big fat K&R!
