Brexit and the US shutdown: two governments in paralysis

Two governments paralyzed. Two populist projects stalled. Two venerable democracies in crisis.

Written by Ellen Barry and Mark Landler

In Parliament, lawmakers are mired in gridlock over Britain’s departure from the European Union, with no clear path forward. In Washington, President Donald Trump stormed out of a meeting with congressional leaders who oppose his border wall, hardening a standoff that has shut down much of the government for longer than ever before.

Two governments paralyzed. Two populist projects stalled. Two venerable democracies in crisis.

Rarely have British and US politics seemed quite so synchronized as they do in the chilly dawn of 2019, three years after the victories of Brexit and Trump upended the two nations’ political establishments. The countries seem subject to a single ideological weather system — one that pits pro-globalization elites against a left-behind hinterland.

The similarities abound: Brexiteers love to compare their cause to the United States’ war for independence. At a recent right-wing rally, one man marched with a scale model of the Liberty Bell. Trump has exuberantly backed Brexit, while his friend, the Brexit godfather Nigel Farage, appears on Fox News, invoking Europe’s migrant crisis as a reason to back Trump’s wall.

“It’s stunning how parallel this is,” said Steve Bannon, who was an architect of Trump’s immigration policy as his former chief strategist and is an ally of Farage. “If you’re going to challenge the system, the system is going to fight back.”