The US government hurtled toward a Wednesday shutdown as Democrats blocked a Republican stopgap funding package that didn’t address their demands, the latest sign that neither party was likely to fold in the final hours before a federal funding deadline.
With no more votes planned in the Senate before a midnight deadline, the White House’s Office of Management and Budget instructed government agencies to “execute their plans for an orderly shutdown.”
Congressional Democrats and President
President Donald Trump says federal workers could be fired if there is a government shutdown. “We may do a lot and that’s only because of the Democrats,” Trump said outside the White House Tuesday morning. Trump says Democrats want “take care of people coming into our country illegally,” and our country can’t handle that. The government could shutdown if no spending deal is reached by midnight. Source: Bloomberg
Trump and congressional leaders showed no outward signs of working toward a deal or a face-saving off-ramp. Instead, both sides concentrated their public comments throughout the day Tuesday on blaming each other for the funding lapse.
One final vote on a stopgap spending bill failed on a vote of 55 to 45 Tuesday evening, with Republicans falling short of the 60 senators needed to overcome a Democratic blockade.
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Government funding expires at midnight. Essential workers like military troops will work without pay while non-essential federal employees are set to be furloughed.
As many as 750,000 federal workers could be temporarily furloughed, even if Trump doesn’t proceed with permanent dismissals, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office estimated.
The president raised the stakes in the fight, telling reporters Tuesday his administration may permanently fire “a lot” of federal workers in the event of a shutdown. The federal government typically has temporarily furloughed workers during a funding lapse and later given them back pay when the shutdown ends.
The Senate vote fell largely along party lines with Democrats
Minutes before, lawmakers also rejected a Democratic measure to extend government funding along largely party-line margins.
WATCH: Senator Roger Marshall discusses the possibility of the government shutting down. Source: Bloomberg
US stock moves were
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A shutdown would be the first since 2018-2019, when funding for the government lapsed for five weeks, spanning New Year’s Day, during Trump’s first term.
Democrats are demanding the renewal of expiring subsidies for Obamacare health insurance premiums in return for their votes for a temporary funding patch and provisions to stop Trump from unilaterally withholding congressionally approved spending. They also want to reverse Medicaid cuts included in Trump’s signature tax legislation passed earlier this year.
Some moderate Republicans have said they are interested in extending the ability of middle-class tax payers to use the Obamacare subsidies but would seek to place new income limits on eligibility.
House Speaker
Trump and Republican congressional leaders have said Democrats should not withhold support from funding the government to try to extract concessions on health care.
Democrats “are taking a risk by having a shutdown,” Trump said at a mid-day Oval Office event. “We’re not shutting it down. We don’t want to shut it down because we have the greatest period of time.”
But Senate Democratic leader
Schumer will have to maintain support for the blockade among vulnerable Democrats wary of a public backlash against disruption of public services. In a March shutdown standoff, nine Democratic senators including Schumer backed off and voted to advance a stopgap through Sept. 30.
Republican Senate Majority Leader
Senator
OMB Director Russell Vought, in his memo to federal agency leaders, said it’s “difficult to predict” how long the shutdown will last.
(Updates with OMB shutdown guidance starting in second paragraph.)
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