Newt Gingrich Details How Democrats Are Poised To Lose Shutdown Battle

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich said Wednesday that congressional Democrats lack a “broader moral purpose” in their fight against President Donald Trump.

The federal government entered a partial shutdown at 12:01 a.m. Eastern Time on October 1 after the Senate failed to pass a continuing resolution, falling short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a Democratic filibuster after the House of Representatives passed the short-term funding bill on September 19. Gingrich told “The Faulkner Focus” host Harris Faulkner that Democratic Rep. Hakeem Jeffries of New York and Democratic Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York “made a mistake” by pursuing a “double negative strategy.” (RELATED: ‘Total Flop’: Dem Guest Tears Up His Party Following Live Stream Failure)

“I think the key to a shutdown is having a moral purpose big enough for the country to rally behind you,” Gingrich told Faulkner. “This is where I think the Democrats made a mistake. We have a project called America’s New Majority Project. We tested: People have two attitudes: First, don’t shut down the government; second, don’t increase spending. They are very strongly opposed to more spending. So what does Schumer do? He shuts down the government in order to increase spending. That’s a double negative. It’s not easy to have a double strategy negative that harms you on both fronts.”

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“President Trump proved it again during his trip to the Middle East [that] he’s very tough, he’s very strategic, he’s very firm,” Gingrich continued, later adding that he doubted Trump would “feel any pressure” to give in to Democratic demands.

Schumer has been criticized by left-wing media figures and Democrats in Congress for his decision to help pass a Republican-backed spending bill to prevent a government shutdown in March. Democrats have demanded more than $1 trillion in funding for a variety of priorities, including continuing enhanced Obamacare payments implemented during the COVID-19 pandemic and restoring funding to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CBP), which will close in January 2026 after its funding was cut under a rescission package passed in July.

Gingrich suggested that Trump could very well shut down “the Democratic parts of government,” hinting that furloughing workers not deemed “essential” could turn into something permanent.

“I always thought that when there was a big snowstorm, they would say only essential workers should show up,” Gingrich said. “It’s pretty dangerous to decide you’re not essential. If you’re not essential, why do you have it? Gallup used to ask people how much waste there was in the federal government? The average answer was 50 percent.”

“So to demonstrate that you can’t shrink government, you can’t reform it, you can’t get rid of wasted things like California’s fast rail, which is a complete joke, a complete waste of money, the subway expansion in New York which costs 10 times as much as London or Paris because of union work rules,” Gingrich continued. “I think the average American is saying, ‘All right, do what you have to do, get the budget under control, start moving toward balance and the Democrats are going to lose this fight.’

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