Gingrich: 'Too Expensive' Politically for Dems to Reject Budget Deal

The government likely will remain open through House Speaker Paul Ryan's "very clever" budget plan, because it will prove "too expensive" politically for Democrats to refuse to approve spending for children's healthcare or for the military, former Speaker Newt Gingrich said Thursday.

"Speaker Ryan has put together a very clever package which includes extending the Children's Health Insurance Program, and postponing three taxes for Obamacare that virtually everybody in both parties is opposed to," Gingrich told Fox News' "Fox and Friends."

Further, he said, it will be "very expensive" for House Democrats to try to explain why they would vote against children's health or the taxes, while there are 10 Democratic senators up for re-election in states President Donald Trump carried in 2016.

"How do they go home and explain that they care so much for people who are here illegally that they're willing to shut down the American military?" he said. "I think that's a very expensive vote and I think in the end people like [West Virginia Sen.] Joe Manchin are going to find it very difficult to go home having voted to close down the American Defense Department."

Gingrich said he suspects if the funding bill passes the House, it will go through the Senate. Even so, "of course you'll be back here in two or three weeks having another round of negotiations."

He said he also thinks Democrats are making a mistake by not pushing themselves for a long-term military spending plan.

On Thursday, the former speaker also was angry about a speech given by Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., in which he accused Trump of using language comparable to that used by late Russian dictator Joseph Stalin.

"Stalin is the second most dangerous person in the 20th century," Gingrich said. "He killed more people than anyone except [Chinese Chairman] Mao Zedong. To compare him to an American president is such an absurdity that Sen. Flake probably could get a job in at CNN or somewhere else as a reporter."

Such "Trump derangement syndrome" was on display earlier this week, he continued, when the press hammered a Navy doctor over Trump's health report.

"Nothing Trump has said is particularly stronger about the press than things that [Abraham] Lincoln would have said, that FDR [Franklin Delano Roosevelt] would have said, things Ronald Reagan would have said," said Gingrich. "Strong presidents often get really angry when they have reporters who they think are being inaccurate or prejudiced or unfair."

• Marc Short: Budget Deal Won't Include DACA Bill
• Immigration Tensions Roil Congress as Shutdown Looms