For months, as Donald Trump has used the levers of the US federal government to consolidate power, silence dissent and punish his political enemies, Democrats have been bombarded with a single demand: do something. Last week, they did.
In a rare display of unity, out-of-power Democrats embraced the risky politics of a government shutdown – their boldest effort yet to rein in a president whom many Americans and constitutional scholars now view as a threat to US democracy.
