Congressional leadership’s meeting at the White House Monday did not appear to make inroads in preventing the impending government shutdown.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., told reporters after the meeting that “significant differences remain” between the two sides.
Vice President JD Vance said he thinks the American people are going to suffer because “these guys won’t do the right thing.”
If the Senate doesn’t pass a continuing resolution to fund the government by midnight Wednesday, the government will partially shut down, leading to federal employees not being paid, as well as interruptions in some government services.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said “there’s nothing partisan” in the continuing resolution, but Senate Democrats are trying to put controversial “extraneous issues” in the stopgap funding bill. These issues include benefits for illegal immigrants, funding for left-wing media outlets, and transgender surgeries in Peru, Republicans said.
“You should go take a look at what they requested, $1.5 trillion in new spending that is unrelated to the ongoing appropriations process,” Johnson said.
“We’re not going to do that,” Johnson continued. “They know we can’t do that, and we never have in the past.”
House Majority Leader John Thune said Democrats are holding the federal government hostage.
“This is purely and simply ‘Hostage Gate’ on behalf of the Democrats,” Thune said.
Johnson said Democrats are jeopardizing military pay, assistance for women and children in need, Federal Emergency Management Agency funding, mental health services, and more.
“The Democrat shutdown would be damaging for the country—and we can’t allow for it,” the speaker said.
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