December 22, 2018 marked the beginning of the second official government shutdown during Trump's presidency. Caused by a major disagreement between Trump and the United States Congress, a shutdown ensued when Trump's absurd demand of $5.7 billion for the border wall between Mexico and America. Known as one of the most notorious ideas of Trump's, he has been pushing the agenda of immigration reform ever since he announced his candidacy for the 2016 election.
Democrats initially brushed it off as another one his far-fetched claims aimed at attracting radical conservatives, but reality has now unfortunately set in for them. Trump is extremely stubborn on the construction of this wall, even if it depletes our country of necessary funds or even worse, lands us in a government shutdown. As we are already very aware, the latter has become true.
Government shutdowns have occurred a number of times in the past, but not without consequence. The shutdown affects all federal employees (which include about a million Americans), leaving them without pay for the entire duration. This issue is emphasized taking into consideration the time of the year of the occurrence, leaving numerous families struggling during the holidays. Over what? A freaking 6-billion-dollar wall. This is all in addition to the disastrous effects on our economy, with some economists warning of a very possible recession.
The American public and government both have been enduring Trump's arrogance and stupidity for, in my opinion, way too long. Sure, he is our elected commander-in-chief, but when he willingly puts American families at stake just to express his stubbornness, it shouldn't take much intellectuality to realize that he is selfish and is willing to go to any ends to satisfy his demands. A multibillion-dollar wall may seem like nothing to a man with so much privilege (and a small loan of a million dollars), but to ordinary Americans that struggle on a day-to-day basis to just feed their families, it is frankly a waste of a very big sum of change.
Six billion dollars could do a damn lot for this country, and a wall should honestly be the last place to spend it. It doesn't take a knowledge of politics to understand that Trump is destroying this country, which is the opposite of what any president should do. Likewise, your political affiliation doesn't matter when it comes to addressing what is best for our nation. While many Republicans already denounce the construction of the wall, joining the Democrats and broadcasting this message more will help this crumbling nation a lot more.