Copyright The Daily Beast
House Speaker Mike Johnson marked Day 28 of the government shutdown by complaining about how little sleep he is getting. The House is in recess for a sixth consecutive week as the standoff over funding the government extends with no end in sight. The House has not had a vote since mid-September, when they skipped town after narrowly passing the temporary spending bill, but Johnson has insisted they’re working around the clock. “Here in Washington, the work has gone on in earnest as well. People keep commenting to me ‘you look so tired on TV.’ I am so tired because we’re not sleeping a lot. We’re working overtime,” he vented. The House Speaker has been visibly agitated as Democrats refuse to cave on their demand that Congress address expiring health care credits as part of negotiations. He has argued there is nothing to negotiate and claims the House will not address health care until the government shutdown ends, even rejecting some calls from members of his own party for the House to return from recess. During his press conference on Tuesday, Johnson rattled off some of the work his caucus members have been doing back home, such as meeting with air traffic officials and working in their districts to access funds from the tax law passed over the summer. Johnson argued that House committees continue to confer to prepare legislation for when the chamber returns to session. He also noted that the House continues to move forward with oversight, noting the GOP House Oversight Committee report released on Tuesday on President Joe Biden’s use of the autopen. However, the halls on the House side of the U.S. Capitol remain largely quiet since the shutdown started on October 1. MAGA favorite and GOP Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene has been a vocal critic of the House being on recess and her party not having a plan to address the looming health care cliff, as premiums are set to skyrocket at the end of the year. She’s called on Senate Majority Leader John Thune to go nuclear to reopen the government without needing 60 votes in the Senate. Greene posted on X on Tuesday that she said during the GOP conference call that she has “no respect for the House not being in session passing our bills and the President’s executive orders.“ “I demanded to know from Speaker Johnson what the Republican plan for healthcare is to build the off-ramp off Obamacare and the ACA tax credits to make health insurance affordable for Americans,” she wrote. “Johnson said he’s got ideas and pages of policy ideas and committees of jurisdiction are working on it, but he refused to give one policy proposal to our GOP conference on our own conference call.” “Apparently I have to go into a SCIF to find out the Republican healthcare plan!!!” she blasted her own party. Johnson said on Tuesday that House Republicans are on a 48-hour return notice, and he will call them back as soon as Democrats vote on the Republican plan. He acknowledged the House business was urgent, but did not back down. “We cannot have a regular legislative session until Democrats do their most basic responsibility to reopen the government and get this moving again,” he declared. The speaker argued that Democrats now have an off-ramp to end the shutdown after the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) on Monday called for Congress to immediately reopen the government without Democrats’ demanding Congress address health care. It was a shift for the union which before the shutdown had been calling for Republicans to negotiate with Democrats looking to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies.
