CNN political director David Chalian said Thursday that the way in which President Donald Trump "caved" last night to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi over the State of the Union indicated not only that the president was finally coming to grips with the California congresswoman's power as the leader of a co-equal branch of government, but also a path forward to ending the shutdown.
"What we saw from President Trump last night when he caved to Speaker Pelosi on just the small side issue of the State of the Union address, and he did so in a way that acknowledged the reality of her power position in this new world order in Washington?" Chalian asked rhetorically. "That was the first shift we saw in the politics of all of this in more than a month."
"I don't want to over-interpret it that it means there's a deal right now to end the shutdown, but for the first time we saw a shift in those political stances and it came from the president," he continued, saying that the president's surrender, taken with offers by Democrats to increase border security funding without a wall, indicated the potential for compromise.
"I do think there are some cracks here that indicate a possible pathway forward," Chalian concluded.
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