It has been more than a week since the government shutdown and the Senate failed again on Wednesday to advance competing spending proposals as more federal employees and the military brace for missed paychecks.
House Speaker Mike Johnson was visibly frustrated on Thursday during his daily news conference as he continued to call out Democrats and Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer for “political theater” and voting six times to keep the government shutdown.
“We voted to keep critical programs funded that ensures federal workers get paid, that our troops and TSA agents, border patrol and many more get their paychecks,” he told reporters. “We’ve done our jobs and the Democrats need to do theirs now.”
Johnson also claimed Schumer bragged in an interview that “every day of this shutdown gets better” for his party.
I don’t even know how to comment on that,” he said. “It’s so stunning how callous he can be to play political games and use American citizens as pawns in a political game.
Vice President JD Vance called the comment from Schumer “a vile sentiment from an alleged leader in our country.”
Johnson added that he took questions on C-SPAN Thursday morning and mentioned a military spouse pleading for the House to pass legislation so that her children with special needs can continue to get the medication needed for them to live their lives.
“I am begging you to pass this legislation,” she said. “My kids could die.”
The speaker responded by saying that if the House held a vote on payments for troops, he believed Schumer would hold it up in the Senate.
Schumer blamed Trump and the Republicans for the shutdown by claiming on Wednesday that they “would rather close the government than fix healthcare for millions of Americans.”
“It’s horrific: Trump is saying he is going to fire people en masse and attempting to deny federal workers their rightfully deserved backpay,” he . “He is using Americans as pawns in his shutdown.”
President Donald Trump has been adamant about furloughed federal workers after the shutdown ends. The White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) argues that the law states back pay is not automatic, and Congress would need to approve it.
Trump told reporters in the Oval Office on Tuesday that “there are some people that don’t deserve to be taken care, and we’ll take care of them in a different way.”
A battle over health care benefits is at the heart of the showdown between lawmakers, with Republicans willing only to to reopen the government. Democrats are seeking the reversal of Medicaid changes included in the “One Big Beautiful Bill” and an extension of Affordable Care Act enhanced tax credits.
The shutdown is also having a , as staffing issues with air traffic controllers have led to delays at multiple major airports.
Controllers have increasingly called out sick since the start of the shutdown last week, according to Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy in a news conference on Monday.
Since they are essential workers, they must continue to work despite the shutdown, but they are not being paid.
The IRS also announced it will furlough nearly half of its workforce.
The agency’s initial Lapsed Appropriations Contingency Plan, which provided for the first five business days of operations, stated that the department would remain open using Democrats’ Inflation Reduction Act funds.
Now, only 39,870 employees, or 53.6%, will remain working as the shutdown continues. It is unclear which workers will remain on the job.