The four big fights Trump and Congress must resolve to avert a government shutdown

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People protest in front of the U.S. Capitol to urge Congress to save the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, on Dec. 6, 2017, in Washington, D.C.

The remarks sparked a political uproar, with condemnation pouring in from Capitol Hill and around the globe even as Trump denied saying it and several Republicans who were in meeting also denied he said it or couldn’t recall his exact words. Trump said he used “tough” language during the session, while Sen. Richard Durbin, D-Ill., said Trump’s comments were “vile” and “racist.”

On Sunday, Trump tweeted that any deal to extend the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program that protected Dreamers “is probably dead because Democrats really don’t want it.” Trump charged Democrats were trying to take money away from the military.

@realDonald Trump tweet

Durbin and several other lawmakers had gone to the White House last Thursday to pitch an agreement they’d reached on immigration—granting the Dreamers a path to citizenship, allocating $2.7 billion for border security and tweaking a visa program open to applicants from countries with low immigration rates to the U.S.

Trump rejected the deal, declaring it “outlandish” and a “setback” in a series of tweets on Friday morning. He accused Democrats of wanting to shut down the government over the immigration issue.

Senate Democratic Leader Charles Schumer has insisted on attaching a Dreamers compromise to the spending bill, saying it’s the only viable path to getting it done. Otherwise, he said, it will never pass the House, where many conservatives are opposed to extending protections to the Dreamers.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said on Thursday that any immigration measure “will not be a part of any overall spending agreement.”

That leaves the two sides divided over substance as well as process — not to mention reeling over the “shithole” brouhaha.

Read more:

Why Congress can’t agree on how to fund the government

Disaster aid

As if the negotiations weren’t fraught enough, there are also sharp disagreements over a disaster aid package for Texas, Florida and other places devastated by hurricanes Harvey, Irma, and Maria.

The House approved an $81 billion bill last month to help western states recover from wildfires and southern states and U.S. territories rebuild from the hurricanes. But the Senate declined to take it up after concerns from Democrats that, among other issues, it did not go nearly far enough to help Puerto Rico, where more than a third of the island remains without electricity.