Congressional leaders continue blame game as clock ticks toward shutdown

(WASHINGTON) — Congressional leaders continued to point fingers at one another as time ticked closer to a 12:01 a.m. Wednesday deadline for the government to shut down if Congress can’t pass a measure to fund it.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune in a news conference Tuesday afternoon said that Democrats had voted for continuing resolutions to keep the government funded 13 times when they were in the majority.

“It begs the question as to what’s changed. And I think what’s changed is President Trump is in the White House. That’s what this is about. This is politics and there isn’t any substantive reason why there ought to be a government shutdown.”

Republicans are pushing for a “clean” continuing resolution that would keep the government funded through mid-November after passing one in March that carried the government through the end of the fiscal year.

But Democrats are holding out for a deal that would restore $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts passed into law this summer on top of a permanent extension of the Obamacare subsidies set to expire at the end of the year, saving health insurance for 3.8 million people at a cost of $350 billion over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer held firm to his belief that Republicans will own this shutdown for refusing to negotiate with Democrats on health care priorities.

“They call it clean, we call it extremely partisan. Not one discussion, House or Senate, between the two leaders. That is not how you negotiate and that is not how you pass appropriation bills,” Schumer said on the Senate floor Tuesday morning.

House Republicans passed a stopgap measure to keep the government open through Nov. 21, the measure stalled in the Senate, where Thune will need at least seven Democrats to vote for it to pass.

Republicans crafted a clean seven-week funding bill in order to create more time for congressional appropriators to work through regular order: 12 separate full-year funding bills. Congress has not passed all 12 appropriations bills through regular order since 1997, and the task has been completed only four times since 1977 when current budget rules took effect.

Thune is expected to force the Senate to vote repeatedly on the House’s clean seven-week funding bill. His goal is to force Democrats to cast repeated votes against funding the government.

He scheduled two votes Tuesday afternoon — both would need 60 votes to pass and both are expected to fail. The first is on the Democrat proposal that includes an extension of the ACA premium tax credits and the reversal of Republican Medicaid cuts. The second is on the House-approved Republican seven-week continuing resolution.

But Senate Democrats appeared unlikely to vote with Republicans to pass the continuing resolution.

“I have never seen Democratic senators more unified and resolute,” Connecticut Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal said. “We are absolutely determined that this ticking clock will not deter us from saving American health care. Literally, it’s about real lives, sickness that can’t wait for a so-called CR, continuing resolution extension of funding. They can filibuster a lot of things, but not people getting sick, and particularly children needing care.”

Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois said Monday’s meeting at the White House with President Donald Trump and congressional leaders from both parties was a missed opportunity to avert a shutdown.

“I think yesterday was an opportunity that was missed. The gathering of the White House was a chance for the legislative leaders with the president to avoid a government shutdown, and there wasn’t any follow-up whatsoever,” Durbin said. “We haven’t had one meeting at the table of the leadership to talk about ending this. It happened yesterday in the White House, but apparently no follow-up.”

Meanwhile, Trump appeared to waver Tuesday on whether there would be a shutdown while continuing to push false claims about what Democrats want in the funding bill.

“Nothing is inevitable, but I would say it’s probably likely, because they want to give health care to illegal immigrants, which will destroy health care for everybody else in our country. And I didn’t see them bend even a little bit when I said, we can’t do that,” Trump said in the Oval Office.

But he later said, “We’re not shutting it down. We don’t want it to shut down because we have the greatest period of time ever. I told you, we have $17 trillion being invested. So the last person that wants to shut down is us.”

Trump said Democrats were “taking a risk” in not supporting the Republicans’ clean continuing resolution, “because of the shutdown, we can do things medically and other ways, including benefits. We can cut large numbers of people. We don’t want to do that, but we don’t want fraud, waste and abuse.”

ABC News confirmed last week that the White House had alerted agencies to prepare for furloughs ahead of a possible government shutdown and also threatening mass firings that could become permanent if a shutdown is not averted.

Asked if he thought it was appropriate to fire federal workers during a shutdown, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham said, “I think you could reduce the federal work force and probably not hurt outcomes.”

Trump appeared open to more discussions earlier Tuesday as he returned from a speech to generals and admirals with Pentagon chief Pete Hegseth. Asked if he would talk to Democrats before the deadline, Trump replied, “Yes.”

Earlier Tuesday, 150 House Democrats rallied on the House steps, presenting unity as each party attempts to place blame for a lapse in funding.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries fired up Democrats, addressing a deepfake video generated by artificial intelligence shared Monday night by President Donald Trump, which disparaged Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

“Mr. President, allow me to reintroduce myself,” Jeffries said, quoting the opening lyrics from Jay-Z’s “Public Service Announcement” and receiving a loud round of applause from the caucus. “I’m the House Democratic Leader. Our caucus is 217 members strong. We serve in a separate and coequal branch of government. We don’t work for you. We work for the American people.”

In the post on his social media platform, Trump shared the video that presented Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Jeffries during their remarks at the White House after meeting with Trump and Republican leaders, but dubbed Schumer saying disparaging things about his party.

The video also showed Jeffries wearing a sombrero, prompting Jeffries to call it “bigoted.”

“Mr. President, the next time you have something to say about me, don’t cop out through a racist and fake AI video. When I’m back in the Oval Office, say it to my face!” Jeffries boomed.

Jeffries sharply criticized House Republicans for canceling votes this week.

“Shame on them for being on vacation all across the country and across the world on the eve of a government shutdown,” he said. “They’re on vacation because they’d rather shut the government down than protect the health care of the American people. That’s unfathomable, that’s unacceptable, that’s unconscionable, and that’s un-American. Do your job.”

Johnson posted Tuesday morning that Schumer and Democrats are “planning to SHUT DOWN the government — simply to oppose President Trump and appease their far-left base.”

ABC News’ Isabella Murray, Hannah Demissie and Emily Chang contributed to this report.

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