Support NeoGAF

[Phoenix RISING]

President Donald Trump signed the $1.3 trillion spending bill to keep the federal government open Friday behind closed doors, then emerged to excoriate Congress for passing the legislation in the first place.

Trump cited misgivings about its contents, but said he agreed to sign the bill to deliver a boost in defense spending -- repeatedly casting the decision as one in which he had "no choice."

"There are a lot of things I'm unhappy about in this bill. There are a lot of things that we shouldn't have had in this bill, but we were in a sense forced if we want to build our military," Trump said. "I said to Congress, I will never sign another bill like this again."


A timeline of DACA offers Trump has rejected

Trump lamented the "ridiculous situation that took place over the last week," pointing out that lawmakers had little time to read through the 2,232-page document, and grumbled about the high price tag, but cited few specific provisions he opposed.

Instead, he vented his frustrations about the compromise-riddled legislation that is largely a product of the narrow Republican majority in Congress and called on the Senate to eliminate the filibuster that requires a 60-vote majority.

"Without the filibuster rule it'll happen just like magic," Trump said.

He also called on Congress to give him "line-item veto" powers for all government spending bills, which the US Supreme Court ruled unconstitutional in 1998.

tl;dr bill highlights:

• $1.6 billion for border fencing, but with the specification that it only apply to existing designs, meaning no wall.
  
  
• The Fix NICS Act, which modestly improves the existing gun background-check system, plus a provision instructing the Centers for Disease Control that it is free to conduct research on gun violence. Such research was effectively stopped in 1996.
  
  
• A slight increase to the IRS budget. While not nearly what the agency needs, especially given the challenge of implementing the new tax law, at least it doesn’t continue the long-standing GOP effort to starve the IRS of funds and make enforcement a joke.
  
  
• $380 million in assistance to states to improve the security of their election systems, and $300 million to the FBI to combat Russian hacking of those systems.
  
  
• No repeal of the Johnson Amendment, which prevents churches from endorsing candidates and acting as political organizations. President Trump has advocated that the amendment be repealed.
  
  
• A bar on employers such as restaurants keeping any portion of workers’ tips. The Trump Labor Department had proposed allowing tip “pooling,” including letting the boss control and potentially take workers’ tips.
  
  
• Increases for the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. Trump had proposed eliminating them entirely.
  
  
• No cuts to the EPA (Trump had proposed cutting the agency’s budget by a third) and an increase in funding for clean energy research through ARPA-E, which Trump had proposed eliminating entirely.
  
  
• Increased funding for affordable housing.
  
  
• Increased education funding, along with what nearly everyone is describing as a complete rejection of Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos’s agenda.
  
  
• Increased funding for the National Institutes of Health.
  
  
• A doubling of child-care funding for low-income families.
  
  
• No defunding of sanctuary cities or Planned Parenthood.

So why was this bill signed after a previous threat of veto? Here's the story I'm buying, as backed by WSJ (paywalled)



lol.

The most pressing question right now is what republicans got in exchange....

Source
Source
Nasa wins

Bonus:

 

[TheShadowLord]

so this is a win for the dems?

 

[Vicetrailia]

Bad negotiations for republicans, but election season is coming and they don't want to get rolled with the bad press.

 

[zelo-ca]

I love how the dems want to get a "DACA" deal yet when there is one on the table they outright refuse it. I do not like everything in this bill but some of it I like. I give it a C

 

[Shamylov]

I love how the dems want to get a "DACA" deal yet when there is one on the table they outright refuse it. I do not like everything in this bill but some of it I like. I give it a C

I think you wrote "the dems" when you meant to write Trump; he's the one who's been lying about how much he wants to pass DACA despite the fact that he ended the program and rejected deals that included it. This is all gaslighting from him; he thinks he can both deny dreamers and have the blame fall on Democrats.

Here's a timeline of events for you:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/23/politics/daca-rejected-deals-trump/index.html

 

[zelo-ca]

I think you wrote "the dems" when you meant to write Trump; he's the one who's been lying about how much he wants to pass DACA despite the fact that he ended the program and rejected deals that included it. This is all gaslighting from him; he thinks he can both deny dreamers and have the blame fall on Democrats.

Here's a timeline of events for you:

https://www.cnn.com/2018/03/23/politics/daca-rejected-deals-trump/index.html

He offered 1.8M DACA recipients a path to legal status for 25B for the wall to be put in this bill and the dems outright rejected it. Didn't even negotiate. The dems want to keep it an issue instead of fixing it.

 

[JDB]

He offered 1.8M DACA recipients a path to legal status for 25B for the wall to be put in this bill and the dems outright rejected it. Didn't even negotiate. The dems want to keep it an issue instead of fixing it.

Trump ends DACA himself and now Democrats are supposed to give him money to waste on his wall?

 

[Shamylov]

He offered 1.8M DACA recipients a path to legal status for 25B for the wall to be put in this bill and the dems outright rejected it. Didn't even negotiate. The dems want to keep it an issue instead of fixing it.

When did this happen? Show me proof.

 

[zelo-ca]

Trump ends DACA himself and now Democrats are supposed to give him money to waste on his wall?

If Trump made an executive order that built the wall so he didn't have to go through congress would you be ok with that?

 

[JDB]

If Trump made an executive order that built the wall so he didn't have to go through congress would you be ok with that?

My point is Trump made this an issue himself and now he's whining to Democrats about it.
Art of the Deal.

 

[Phoenix RISING]

If Trump made an executive order that built the wall so he didn't have to go through congress would you be ok with that?

After he said he'd make Mexico pay for it?

I think a LOT of people would have a problem with that.

 

[gatti-man]

He offered 1.8M DACA recipients a path to legal status for 25B for the wall to be put in this bill and the dems outright rejected it. Didn't even negotiate. The dems want to keep it an issue instead of fixing it.

This is wrong. Please change where you get information, this is a flat out lie.

 

[Sàmban]

He offered 1.8M DACA recipients a path to legal status for 25B for the wall to be put in this bill and the dems outright rejected it. Didn't even negotiate. The dems want to keep it an issue instead of fixing it.

As others have already pointed out, you are horribly misinformed. And I’m not surprised. We wouldn’t even be talking about this if Trump didn’t create the problem...wtf reality do you even live in?

If Trump made an executive order that built the wall so he didn't have to go through congress would you be ok with that?

This question is baity dumb shit. You’re covering up for being called out on being horribly misinformed.

 

[WaterAstro]

Trump wants to betray both Republicans and Democrats. lol

He just made himself look like a tool.