U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune

Political scientist Larry Sabato is warning that President Donald Trump and the Republican Party may exploit the likely federal government shutdown, saying that the GOP, as the “anti-government party,” is “perfectly happy” when the government shuts down and “perfectly happy to eliminate quite a number of domestic policy programs.”

Republicans will “go after anything that Democrats normally favor, and they’ll probably try to do it in a way that will not be repairable once this shutdown ends,” warned Professor Sabato, founder and director of the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia. He noted that the Trump administration’s goals include shrinking or eliminating large parts of the federal government.

Calling it “a very real threat,” Sabato told CNN that the White House has already warned that a shutdown could provide “a pretext for laying off many more federal workers.”

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“They’re going to use this as best they can. Never let a crisis go to waste — that’s their theory.”

Sabato said it “would take a pocket full of miracles to stop what’s likely to happen at midnight,” and warned that “Trump is not bluffing.”

“The reason the implications are serious is because so much of what the U.S. government does grinds to a halt,” Sabato also said.

“Probably the most serious part of it is that the troops and the TSA officers and lots of other people, including air traffic controllers, while they have to show up, are not paid. So if this goes on for 35 days, there are a lot of families who are without food.”

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“But, look,” he added, “the only thing that could break this and keep it relatively short is if you had mass protests from, say, the TSA workers and the air traffic controllers.”

“Oh, and by the way, the military — none of them are paid during a government shutdown, yet they are mandated to attend work.”

“Well, you know, that tends to wear on people, especially if they can’t pay their weekly or monthly bills.”

America, Sabato said, is “headed for another disaster and another advertisement to the world that the American system no longer works.”

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