Congressional leaders left a meeting with President Donald Trump on Monday without any agreement to head off a partial government shutdown and no apparent exit strategy once the federal funding lapse begins on Wednesday.
The Oval Office session did nothing to resolve “very large differences” between the two parties that make a shutdown likely, Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., told reporters after the meeting.
Republicans want a “clean,” seven-week funding extension, which the House passed Sept. 19 before Democrats blocked it in the Senate. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., had planned to call it up for a do-over vote Tuesday, but that seems likely to encounter the same fate as earlier this month.
Schumer said any stopgap funding deal must include an extension of enhanced tax credits for health insurance bought on government-run exchanges that will otherwise expire at the end of this year. Democrats also want protections against additional White House efforts to claw back previously appropriated money.
“I think we’re headed to a shutdown because the Democrats won’t do the right thing,” Vice President JD Vance said after the meeting. “I hope they change their mind.”
Schumer, in a later news conference, said he and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., rejected the GOP insistence on negotiating an extension of the health care premium subsidies separately from the continuing resolution that is needed by Tuesday night, when current funding runs out.
While Republicans argue the health care tax credits can be negotiated later, Schumer said the matter is too urgent because insurance notices will be issued in October, with open enrollment for plans offered on the exchanges beginning Nov. 1.
“So we think when they say later, they mean never,” Schumer said. “We have to do it now, first because of the timing issue and second, because now is the time we can get it done.”
Schumer said he asked Republicans to add a permanent extension of the bigger subsidies to the House-passed continuing resolution, along with provisions from the Democratic alternative stopgap bill designed to rein in the president’s power to impound or rescind money already appropriated by Congress.
If those provisions were adopted, he said, “we could avoid a shutdown. But it’s in the president’s hands whether we avoid a shutdown. He has to convince the Republican leaders.”
Schumer said that while health care was the top Democratic concern, he also stressed to Trump the importance of preserving the congressional power of the purse.
“We made the point clear, that how can we negotiate a bipartisan agreement and then have the president, unilaterally through impoundment, or the Republican Party through rescissions, and the president unilaterally through pocket rescissions, undo it all without any [Democratic] input,” he said.
‘Hostage-taking’
Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., flatly dismissed the Democratic demands as unreasonable as they left the White House.
“This is purely, simply, hostage-taking on behalf of the Democrats,” Thune said. “We are willing to sit down and work with them on some of the issues they want to talk about, whether it’s the extension of premium tax credits, with reforms, we’re happy to have that conversation. But as of right now, this is a hijacking of the American people.”
Republicans have sought to tie an extension of health care subsidies to new caps on income eligibility limits and guardrails against fraud.
When asked if he was open to such changes, Schumer said: “We said to him, renew it so that people aren’t hurt, and then we can discuss whatever reforms you want. But you got to renew it now.”
Johnson said Democrats were attempting “to bring in extraneous issues” instead of passing a simple funding extension. “There’s nothing partisan in here, no policy riders, none of our big party preferences, because we want to do the right thing by the American people and allow more time for negotiation.”
Vance said Schumer and Jeffries “had some ideas that I actually thought were reasonable and they had some ideas that the president thought was reasonable. What’s not reasonable is to hold those ideas as leverage to shut down the government unless we give you everything you want.”
‘Kicking it down the road’
Schumer said Trump appeared open to considering his ideas, but that the GOP leadership appeared intransigent.
“The Republican leaders were…adamant that they do nothing on rescission, and they just wanted to kick the health care problem down the road,” Schumer said. “Well, they’ve been kicking it down the road since March,” when Congress last passed a continuing resolution.
Johnson also sought to pin the blame on Democrats if a shutdown occurs, saying it would lead to unpaid troops and federal employees, a cut-off in nutrition assistance for women and children, and harm to a wide range of government services including disaster aid.
“FEMA won’t be funded. We have hurricanes off the coast of the United States right now,” Johnson said, referring to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. “This is serious business.”
But Democrats said the party in control of the government would be held responsible. “If the government shuts down, it’s because Republicans have decided to shut the government down and hurt the American people,” Jeffries said. “That’s a point that we made loudly and clearly in that meeting.”
White House budget director Russ Vought, whose repeated attempts to hold up or cancel appropriated funds have angered Democrats, told reporters, “We want to keep this government open. It is not good for the American people to have the government shut down for any period of time.”
If a shutdown occurs, he said, “We will manage it appropriately, but it is something that can all be avoided.”
Paul M. Krawzak and Aidan Quigley contributed to this report.
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