Trump's plan for the shutdown:
- With only essential personnel on the job and the "resistance" furloughed Trump's appointees can implement his agenda much more easily.
- This may show that a smaller government works better.
- Possibly, it will lead to permanent reduction in the size of the federal government.
I don't know who wrote this (below) and I don't mean to imply a specific person but it does look to me like something Steve Bannon or someone influenced by his strategic thinking would write. The point being that the shutdown may not be merely a dispute between Trump and congress, but something Trump planned from the beginning of his administration as part of a strategy to achieve Bannon's goal of deconstructing the administrative state.
https://dailycaller.com/2019/01/14/smoke-out-resistance/
"The Daily Caller is taking the rare step of publishing this anonymous op-ed at the request of the author, a senior official in the Trump administration whose identity is known to us and whose career would be jeopardized by its disclosure.
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Due to the lack of funding, many federal agencies are now operating more effectively from the top down on a fraction of their workforce, with only select essential personnel serving national security tasks.
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Senior officials can reprioritize during an extended shutdown, focus on valuable results and weed out the saboteurs. We do not want most employees to return, because we are working better without them.
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Now that we are shut down, not only are we identifying and eliminating much of the sabotage and waste, but we are finally working on the president’s agenda.
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President Trump does not need Congress to address the border emergency, and yes, it is an emergency. Billions upon billions of hard-earned tax dollars are still being dumped into foreign aid programs every year that do nothing for America’s interest or national security. The president does not need congressional funding to deconstruct abusive agencies who work against his agenda. This is a chance to effect real change, and his leverage grows stronger every day the shutdown lasts.
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The president should add to his demands, including a vote on all of his political nominees in the Senate.
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To be a victory, this shutdown must be different than those of the past and should achieve lasting disruption with two major changes ...
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Our founders envisioned a free market night watchman state ... Furloughed employees should find other work, never return and not be paid.
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But if it proves that government is better when smaller, focusing only on essential functions that serve Americans, then President Trump will achieve something great that Reagan was only bold enough to dream.
The president’s instincts are right. Most Americans will not miss non-essential government functions. A referendum to end government plunder must happen. Wasteful government agencies are fighting for relevance but they will lose. Now is the time to deliver historic change by cutting them down forever."