Trump signs budget ending longest government shutdown in US history

The longest government shutdown in US history has ended after 43 days, after the House of Representatives passed the budget to fund the government until January 30. Donald Trump signed the bill early this morning from the Oval Office, surrounded by some Republican members of Congress and with the Speaker of the House, his right-hand man Mike Johnson, at his side. Trump wanted to make the Democrats pay the price for the shutdown, which affected millions of Americans, three days after the agreement. in the Senate to end the shutdown"I want to tell Americans never to forget this when the midterm "And other dates, don't forget what [the Democrats] have done to our country," Trump said before signing the budget plan. The more than 40 days of government shutdown have been a power struggle between Republicans and Democrats, with blame being traded. The Democrats decided not to approve the budget for the Republicans. Their condition for voting in favor was that the Republicans extend Obamacare benefits that expire at the end of the year, a demand they never accepted and which has finally been reduced to a promise to put it to a vote, without guarantees, since both houses of Congress are controlled by Republicans.

Trump has focused much of his Oval Office rhetoric on "making America affordable again," rather than attacking Democrats. The president's renewed emphasis on this issue implies a tacit acknowledgment of the success of the Democratic campaigns in the November 4 elections, who focused their speeches on the cost of living. It also indicates how Trump is aware of the citizens' discontent with his policies, which has already been evident at the polls this November and could have a much greater impact on next year's legislative elections if he doesn't rectify the situation.

In fact, without anyone asking him, Trump has already attacked the newly elected mayor of New York, Zohran Mamdani, whom he has once again labeled a "communist." In mentioning Mamdani, the Republican highlighted the internal divisions within the party, recalling how "the more left-leaning wing" of the party wanted to continue pushing for a government shutdown. The more progressive wing of the Democrats has been calling for Chuck Schumer's boss, the Senate Minority Leader and one of the faces of the establishment of the party, for breaking voting discipline.

Trump wants to stoke the internal divisions that have resurfaced within the Democrats with Mamdani's victory and the discord over the government shutdown, hoping they'll forget about him. The danger for the Republican is that there will be party unity to create a strategy against him in the midterms.

No questions about the Epstein case

At the end of the signing, Trump did not answer questions from the press to avoid the issues that have resurfaced with the New emails and documents about the Epstein case. Correspondence released by Democrats on the House investigative committee suggests that Trump spent "hours" with one of Jeffrey Epstein's victims and was aware of his child trafficking ring. Earlier in the day, Trump denied the new revelations, calling them a distraction tactic by Democrats. Meanwhile, Republicans on the committee released 23,000 pages of documents related to the case, including new emails. While the relevance and significance of this information to the case remains to be seen, it is already enough to divert attention from the revelations about the other communications. The material released by the Republicans includes emails that mention Peter Thiel, founder of Palantir and a patron of Vice President J.D. Vance, and also discuss the Trump-Putin relationship. In one of the emails, Epstein suggested to former Norwegian Prime Minister Thorbjørn Jagland that Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, could obtain "information" about Trump by speaking with him. The email was written to Jagland in June 2018, a month before Trump met with Putin in Helsinki, Finland. At the time, Jagland was chairing the European Council.