Just two days until a potential government shutdown, the top four congressional leaders pointed fingers at each other on Sunday, blaming the opposite party over the possibility that funding will run out on Tuesday.
Democrats said that any shutdown would be pinned to Republicans, who currently control the House, Senate and White House, and who they say have been thus far unwilling to work across the aisle despite the fact that they need some Democratic support to pass a funding bill.
“We’ve made clear that we’re ready, willing, and able to sit down with anyone at any time and at any place in order to make sure that we can actually fund the government, avoid a painful Republican-caused shutdown and address the health care crisis that Republicans have caused that’s impacting everyday Americans all across the country,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said on ABC’s “This Week.”
“It’s my hope that we’ll avoid one,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said about a possible shutdown on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “At the end of the day, Republicans do control the House, the Senate, and the presidency … It’s up to them, if they come into the meeting to seriously negotiate.”
A hard line is still being drawn by Schumer and Jeffries against a seven-week clean government funding stopgap that was passed by the House but failed to pass in the Senate. Democrats’ preeminent demand over health care, specifically, is that they want to extend subsidies that were part of the Affordable Care Act.
Republican leaders said Sunday that Democratic demands during this process are unreasonable and that the GOP’s continuing resolution that is being considered would simply buy Congress time to work on things like health care subsidies that expire at the end of the year.
It’s “totally up to the Democrats,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said on “Meet the Press,” pinning the possibility of a shutdown on them.
“This is the ball is in their court. There is a bill sitting at the desk in the Senate right now. We can pick it up today and pass it that has been passed by the House, that will be signed into law by the president to keep the government open … What the Democrats have done here is take the federal government as a hostage, and for that matter, that by extension, the American people, to try and get a whole laundry list of things that they want,” Thune said.
On the eve of the four congressional leaders’ meeting with President Donald Trump at the White House, which comes after the president cancelled a separate meeting with Democrats last week, the top Republicans provided little indication that real negotiations will happen with their colleagues across the aisle.
“I talked with [Trump] at length yesterday, and he’s going to tell Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries to stop playing political games,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said on Fox News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” about the meeting.
“He’s always open to discussion, but he wants to operate in good faith, so he decided to bring us all in. He wants to talk with Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries and just try to convince them to follow common sense and do what’s right by the American people,” Johnson said on CNN.
But ultimately, Johnson said Trump wants to avoid a shutdown.
“He does not want the Democrats to hold up troops pick, you know, the people who are serving, they don’t get paid. He doesn’t want WIC funding, no Women, Infants and Children nutrition program being held up. He doesn’t want telehealth and mental health and FEMA services to be stopped. That’s what Chuck Schumer is holding hostage,” Johnson said on CNN.
Democratic leaders said they were a bit more optimistic about the meeting, and said there are expectations that “serious negotiations” will come out of it.
“It depends on the Republicans. You know, we need the meeting. Is a first step, but only a first step. We need a serious negotiation. Now, if the president at this meeting is going to rant and just yell at Democrats and talk about all his alleged grievances and say this, that and the other thing, we won’t get anything done,” Schumer said.
Schumer said that Democrats have already seen some wins from their efforts to hold the line — simply the fact that they’re meeting with Trump after he cancelled their original plans is an indication that he’s feeling some pressure on the issue.
“Saturday evening, we got a call from the White House that they would do it Monday at 2pm. So we’re delighted. It’s a good first step,” Schumer said.
Schumer faced major backlash from his party for working with Republicans to avert a shutdown earlier this year. Asked if pressure from his base is making him want to stand up to Trump this time, Schumer replied “absolutely not.”
“We’re hearing from the American people that they need help on health care and as for these massive layoffs,” he said.
But Republicans called Schumer’s change of heart over a shutdown “political posturing.”
“It’s politics. It is political posturing. They are afraid of their base, and they’re trying to do something to get them motivated and not angry at them,” Thune said.
Johnson said Schumer “knows it’s a nonstarter. He’s trying to, quote, show a fight against Trump, and it makes absolutely no sense,” Johnson said.
If the government does shut down, Schumer claimed that Republicans will quickly come back to them for negotiations because they will feel “heat” from angry people across the country.
“The heat will be on them if they do it. We hope they don’t. We don’t want to shut down. We hope that they sit down and have a serious negotiation with us. That’s how it’s I would remind Leader Thune, that’s how we all did it in the past, a bipartisan negotiation. That’s why the government didn’t shut down while I was leader,” Schumer said.
Thune signaled an unwillingness to negotiate health care issues right now — that any discussions on the subject could happen closer to the end of the year after a shutdown has been averted.
“I will say that that is an issue which is going to have to be that that particular program is desperately in need of reform,” Thune said. “I think there’s potentially a path forward. We have to see where it goes, but we can’t do it while the American people are being held hostage by the Democrats in a government shutdown. Keep the government open.”
Speaker Johnson maintained that passing the CR is just “buying a little time.”
“The Obamacare subsidies is a policy debate that has to be determined by the end of the year, December 31, not right now while we’re simply trying to keep the government open so we can have all these debates.”