US media said that US President Trump is creating chaos in Congress in the final weeks of his term. With the administration likely to face a shutdown, Congress will resume next week for an unusual holiday meeting to vote against the president's decision to veto the annual defense bill.
According to the US "Capitol Hill" daily newspaper website reported on December 24, Trump's series of moves have torn the Republican Party apart, and his series of controversial pardon orders have been slammed by Democrats as a serious abuse of power.
It is in this environment that lawmakers will try to find a way forward next week — unless Mr. Trump brings a new surprise and either signs or rejects a massive spending plan of up to $2.3 trillion in the coming days.
A former White House official said Trump was 50 percent likely to cash in on his threat to veto the bill or drag it on for 10 days, thereby shelving the veto package of bailouts and grants.
While some Republicans support Trump, there is also a clear sense of disappointment.
Republican Rep. Don Bacon said on a conference call on the 23rd that he felt "Trump threw us under the bottom of the Bass" because Trump did not participate in the negotiations, just to veto the bailout bill after it was passed.
Trump's abrupt rollover of the bailout bill is reportedly just the latest move in his break with congressional Republicans.
Trump honored his threat on the 23rd by vetoing the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal 2021 after he complained that the bill did not repeal an unrelated policy to protect social media companies. The number of votes in favor of both houses of Congress to pass the bill was enough to overturn the president's veto.
Trump also announced two batches of pardons granted to his controversial allies on the 22nd and 23rd, including Paul Manafort, Roger Stone, Charles Kushner and former Republican Reps. Chris Collins and Duncan Hunt. Collins and Hunter were two of Trump's earliest supporters in Congress, both of whom pleaded guilty to multiple corruption charges.
Meanwhile, Trump continues to claim that elections have been "stolen" or "manipulated," despite similar allegations repeatedly being dismissed by courts. There is no evidence of massive election fraud that led to Trump's defeat to President-elect Biden.
The report also said that Trump met with some Republican house members loyal to him on the 21st to discuss the possibility of overturning the results of the Electoral College vote in January, but Senate leaders warned that the move would end in failure.
People close to the White House expect Trump to issue more pardons in the coming weeks. He has publicly asked lawyers to investigate his unsubstantiated allegations of election fraud, and Trump is unlikely to work with Biden's transition team.
Trump's public schedule has been hardly anything in the past two weeks, and he has not addressed the media since early December. Instead, he delivered his message almost entirely to the outside world through Twitter and posting pre-recorded videos on social media.
The White House added a message to Trump's schedule on the 24th and unusually insisted that he had been working hard, even though he had just arrived in Florida.
The message said: "As the holiday season approaches, Trump will continue to work tirelessly for the American people." His schedule includes many meetings and phone calls. ”
At 10:18 a.m. on the 24th, Trump arrived at his golf club in West Palm Beach. Soon after, cameras captured his presence on the pitch. (Compiler/Jun Guo)
Source: Reference News Network