BORDER/GOVERNMENT/NANCY PELOSI/TRUMP AS PRESIDENT/WALL: “There’s no spinning what happened in Washington on Friday [1-25-19]: Donald Trump caved to Nancy Pelosi — and a compromise to reopen the government was struck. The bigger question is how. How, after 3+ years of Trump running roughshod on the political process, did Pelosi, the newly installed speaker of the House, beat him at his own game? The answer is remarkably simple: She said ‘no.’ And stuck to it. Pelosi, from the start, insisted that neither she nor any Democrats would cooperate with any negotiation that sought to leverage a government shutdown for Trump to try to secure the $5.7 billion he wanted for a border wall. The key to saying something so definitive is a) sticking to it and b) enforcing it. There was never a peep from any House Democrat that they should make concessions on the wall to Trump. Not any meaningful dissent. For 35 days of a shutdown.”
–Chris Cillizza, “How Nancy Pelosi broke Donald Trump,” CNN Politics, CNN.com, January 25, 2019 9:03 pm