So are there any accounts by federal workers on how they feel about all this? Are they blaming Trump or the Dems for not giving him his wall? Anyone personally know or are a federal worker here?
If it were like previous shutdowns, it probably would've been split down the party lines and Trump's approval numbers wouldn't be tanking - they would just be in a holding pattern like always.
The key difference this time around is that Trump (and people on Trump's side) are moronically downplaying the effect of the shutdown, whether trying to say it's "mostly democrats" that are affected, or saying that the wall "matters more than the Yosemite giftshop being open."
Trump's present-day base - by this point, a collection of people with shockingly low amount of empathy for others - was only ever going to erode when it was personally affected by his presidency. Up until the shutdown, I had thought that meant that the only way his core support would deteriorate would be when the economy finally started to go south, since that core would finally be affected by ridiculous policies like ludicrous tariffs. But now, enough of his own base is affected in some direct or indirect way by the shutdown that it's like he's shot himself politically in the foot.
He's trying to deflect blame of the shutdown while also saying it's not really having a significant impact - some of his stupidest followers that are not yet affected by the shutdown still eat up that doublespeak, but it's showing to be enough of a wake-up call to other followers that are being personally affected. They probably would have been able to be convinced that it was the democrats' fault if they stuck just to that message (they have ridden this far on the MAGA train, after all), but being told that the shutdown doesn't really matter is proving enough to wake some of them up.
