Trump Has Lost the Governing Plot - WSJ Editorial [View all]
Republicans don’t want to say this publicly, but privately they do: President Trump’s personal political obsessions are hurting his Presidency, harming the chances for further policy gains the rest of this year, and putting control of the House and Senate in jeopardy.
That’s the backdrop to the GOP revolt this week in Congress on war powers and funding for the Department of Homeland Security. Mr. Trump’s unrelated priorities are handing Democrats gift after gift and forcing Republicans to take difficult votes that could cost them in November. His desire for political revenge is also alienating Members of Congress he will need this year.
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Democrats planned to offer amendments to the DHS funding bill that would put Republicans on record for supporting a taxpayer payout to convicted rioters and Mr. Trump’s friends and allies. Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, hardly a GOP faint heart, said someone had called it a “galactic blunder,” and “that’s probably true.” Mr. Trump has already pardoned the rioters but now he wants the rest of us to pay them.
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Then there’s Mr. Trump’s East Wing ballroom fixation, for which he wants $220 million from Congress. He has a point about hardened security for the new White House area, but he had said when he first tore down the old East Wing that it would require no public money. The parliamentarian struck the ballroom funding from the DHS bill under budget reconciliation rules, so now the GOP will need 60 votes (not 51) to pass ballroom funding. Mr. Trump naturally berated GOP Senators for not firing the parliamentarian.
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Mr. Trump’s Presidency will be all but over—except for impeachment 3.0—if the GOP loses control of Congress in November. If he wants to accomplish more legislatively, he has only a few months to do it. Does he want his remaining legacy to be a ballroom, an Arc de Trump, and payoffs for his friends from a fund that Republicans would denounce if a Democratic President tried it? Mr. Trump needs a second-year reset, or he is headed toward a second-term failure.
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