What to expect when you’re expecting MAGA to shut down the government
Leaves are falling, there’s a chill in the air, and MAGA Republicans are trying to shut the government down. Welcome to this month’s Leah & Ezra newsletter, where we share our takes and what’s on our minds.
I’ll be writing these for the next few months while Ezra is out. And today, I want to talk about the next totally unnecessary MAGA-induced crisis: the looming government shutdown.
Now you might be thinking: Didn’t we just go through this whole cycle a few months ago? The brinksmanship, the urgent warnings, the crisis over government funding? Why on earth is this happening again?
The short answer: Because Republicans have handed the car keys to the most extreme members of their caucus and they’re driving us all off a cliff.
The long answer: The May default crisis was resolved in the nick of time with a deal between President Biden and Kevin McCarthy. That deal set top-line spending levels for the coming year’s budget.
Extreme MAGA Republicans have spent the last several months agitating against the deal. Their demands are wide-ranging and radical. They want dramatic cuts to federal programs. They want to defund the DOJ and aid to Ukraine. They want to restrict access to medication abortion. They want drastic cuts to social safety net programs. In short, they want to move the goalposts for the budget process into right-wing fantasy land. As a result, Republican House members are currently literally unable to agree with each other on how to fund the federal government.
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