President Donald Trump explicitly said his administration had been cutting and would continue to cut “popular Democrat programs” during the ongoing government shutdown, an admission that his administration was wielding its power to punish his opponents.
“We’re only going to cut Democrat programs,” Trump said Thursday at a televised Cabinet meeting. “I hate to tell you, I guess that makes sense, but we’re only cutting Democrat programs. … We’ll be cutting some very popular Democrat programs that aren’t popular with Republicans, frankly, because that’s the way it works.”
The president did not share his definition of “Democrat programs,” but Trump and his allies have repeatedly suggested they’ll inflict pain on Democrats over their votes against government funding. Last week, the administration sought to strip billions of dollars’ worth of energy programs from Democratic-led states while leaving similar ones intact in Republican-led states.
“The shutdown has been, you know, pretty damaging. I mean, not yet, because it’s early, but it gets a little bit worse as it goes along, and we’ll be making cuts that will be permanent.” Trump said. “They wanted to do this, so we’ll give a little taste of their own medicine.”
Red states are expected to feel the impact of some of the administration’s energy program cuts even if they avoid direct cuts to their programs. Some of the programs already targeted by the Trump administration have bipartisan support, with members urging the president directly to avoid making such cuts.
Even while trumpeting program cuts, Trump administration officials lamented the impact of the shutdown on Americans.
“All of us are going to work on for the rest of the day, we’ve been working on for days, is how to make the shutdown as painless as possible on the American people,” Vice President JD Vance said at the Cabinet meeting.
“The Democrat shutdown is causing pain and suffering for hard-working Americans, including our military, our air traffic controllers and impoverished mothers, people with young children, people that have to live not the greatest of lives,” Trump said.
He added that he expected a swift resolution to the shutdown, telling reporters, “I think it’s going to work out. I think it’s going to work out very well.”