Au contraire ... the government backed down from a showdown at the Bundy Ranch earlier this year. The government does not want a showdown. Because if it happens, the gov't will be accused of not enforcing the law while ordinary citizens do. Then the midterm elections will swing even more to the GOP. I'd be surprised if any seat in the House except in the inner city went to the Dems.
Obama was forced into this situation by that a--wipe Mexican congressman (yes, he's Mexican because he doesn't have a patriotic bone in his body) from Chicago, Luis Gutierrez. With help from Holder and Johnson, they created the crisis and then innocently pretended that it happened on its own. Sound familiar? Think Operation Fast and Furious.
They didn't expect that normal Americans would rise up and demand that disease-ridden, filthy, and uneducated "immigrants" be sent home.
Another important consideration on why the government doesn’t want a confrontation is because there’s no guarantee that Federal officers will actually participate in one.
And what happens if/when Federal officers start refusing to obey orders?
People, I think, don’t give Federal officers enough credit. Iirc there were clear indications, posted in threads here, during the Bundy Ranch situation that the Federal officers wanted no part of a showdown, and were clearly communicating that up their chains of command.
Then consider all the NPS Rangers who found other directions to look in, other places to be, during the whole barrycades civil disobedience during the shutdown ...