Chuck Schumer slams Trump for 'skipping town' amid shutdown as president departs for Asia trade tour

WASHINGTON, DC: Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer ripped into President Donald Trump Friday for what he called “skipping town” during a government shutdown. 

The jab came as Trump packed his bags and boarded Air Force One for a weeklong diplomatic trade tour through Asia, with stops in Malaysia, Japan, and South Korea.

Chuck Schumer accuses Trump of 'skipping town' during shutdown

Washington is locked in a bitter stalemate over the shutdown that’s now dragging into its third week, and Schumer’s not buying the president’s international priorities. “In the midst of the longest full government shutdown in American history — a crisis of his own making — President Trump’s priorities are severely misplaced,” Schumer said in a statement.

“While Americans are struggling to make ends meet, federal workers are going without pay, and millions of families are bracing for soaring health care costs, the President is leaving the country,” he continued. “America is shut down and the President is skipping town," he declared.

Schumer accused Trump of ignoring his duties while federal employees wait for paychecks and families face the fallout of a shuttered government.

“Democrats have asked, again and again, for President Trump to meet with us to negotiate a bipartisan deal that would address the healthcare crisis, and find a path forward to reopen the government,” Schumer said. “But instead of doing his job, President Trump is abandoning it.”

The Senate leader urged his Republican counterparts to step up while the President is overseas. “With the President out of the country, the responsibility falls squarely on Congressional Republicans to act — to come to the table, to do their jobs, and to deliver an agreement that reopens the government and protects Americans from another health care disaster,” he said.

Schumer added, “Americans deserve a government that works as hard as they do — not a leader that flies away from responsibility at the time they need one most.”

Trump’s trade tour takes off

Trump’s Asia agenda kicked off Saturday with a full schedule.

The president’s first stop was Malaysia, where he arrived Sunday, October 26, to attend the annual Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Summit in Kuala Lumpur.

While there, Trump witnessed East Timor’s formal induction as ASEAN’s 11th member and presided over a peace agreement between Thailand and Cambodia, putting an official end to a border conflict that had been simmering since July. Capping off the visit, Trump and Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim co-signed a trade deal on Sunday.  

The next scheduled stop is Tokyo. On Monday, Trump is set to meet Japan’s newly elected conservative Prime Minister, Sanae Takaichi. The pair will reportedly talk about security cooperation and celebrate Japan’s $550 billion investment package into the US economy. That deal helped Tokyo snag a break from stiffer U.S. tariffs earlier this year.

But the most anticipated part of Trump’s Asian adventure is slated for Wednesday, October 29, when the president will touch down in South Korea for the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) summit in Gyeongju. The US President is scheduled for a high-stakes, face-to-face with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Busan on Thursday.

The meeting is expected to tackle everything from rare earth exports and US soybean purchases to cooperation on fentanyl trafficking. Trump is scheduled to head back to Washington shortly after the summit.