We will be forced to close the Southern Border entirely if the Obstructionist Democrats do not give us the money to finish the Wall & also change the ridiculous immigration laws that our Country is saddled with. Hard to believe there was a Congress & President who would approve!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 28, 2018

Donald Trump entered the holiday season with a bulletproof plan for advancing his electoral and legislative goals: He would sabotage the basic functioning of the government that he presides over, so as to draw attention to the fact that the Democratic Party does not support an extremely unpopular immigration policy. Or, more concretely, he would refuse to fund the federal government until congressional Democrats agreed to appropriate upwards of $5 billion for his border wall (even though the Republican Senate had already signaled that it was willing to fund the government without such an appropriation, and Democrats would only need to wait a matter of days before they assumed control of the House).

And yet, somehow, the government has been (partially) shuttered for six days now — and the Democrats have yet to surrender.