I joined colleagues on the floor last night to insist upon immediate reopening of the government. This shutdown is a horror show for tens of thousands of my constituents, including federal workers and private contractors, air traffic controllers and park rangers, scientists and technicians, Coast Guard personnel and TSA agents. But it is not a shot-in the-dark. I explain how this unremitting assault on federal workers and our government began in January of 2017 when Trump imposed a federal hiring freeze, reinstated the Holman Rule, started slashing federal worker pay and benefits and launched a campaign to destroy federal worker unions. The original political philosopher of the Trump Administration openly declared the goal of this new Banana Republican party: “deconstruction of the administrative state.” That’s my constituents they’re “deconstructing”—the people who are keeping our air, water and land clean; the people who make flying safe; the people keeping our parks from overflowing with waste and garbage; the people protecting public health and ridding our food supply of E Coli, Salmonella and insect infestation. The first Republican President, Abraham Lincoln, saved the Union and defended our government. The first Banana Republican President is trying to wreck the Union and destroy the government. We must come together and stop him. | Rep. Jamie Raskin