The Senate rejected dueling government funding bills for the sixth time Wednesday amid growing frustration over the shutdown stalemate.
The back-to-back votes come as there’s no sign of a quick offramp, with congressional leaders only becoming further entrenched the longer the funding lapse drags on.
Pouring new fuel into the standoff — and catching top Republicans off guard — was a recent suggestion from White House officials that furloughed federal workers might not get back pay. Yet more than a week since lawmakers blew past the deadline to fund government operations, party leaders continue to talk past each other in press conferences, television interviews and social media posts.
“We are in Day Eight of the government shutdown, which is unfortunate and unnecessary and totally at the behest of left-wing Democrats’ special interest groups who have pressured the Democrat leadership into a position that makes absolutely no sense to any thinking person,” Majority Leader John Thune said ahead of the vote.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer reiterated that Democrats are ready to discuss both government funding and health care.
“This is not an either-or-thing, which Republicans are making it,” Schumer said.
Democrats believe the first step to breaking the impasse involves Republicans at least talking to colleagues across the aisle. Top Republicans, however, are solidified in their stance that there is nothing to negotiate on soon-to-expire Affordable Care Act subsidies before reopening the government.
“The only way they’ve communicated is through these AI meme videos, which is a ridiculous way to run a country,” Rep. Sara Jacobs (D-Calif.) said in a brief interview. “You get to an outcome by actually talking to each other, not by press conferences, not by silly meme videos.”
The House has been out of session since last month, with Speaker Mike Johnson vowing he won’t bring the chamber back until the Senate passes the GOP-led stopgap bill, which funds the government through Nov. 21.
“When the House agrees on something that’s not offensive … you ought to take it with a bow, thank them for it and pass the damn thing,” Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), who served in the House for six years, said in a brief interview. “If we send something more complicated back to the House, I just think we run the risk of it collapsing.”
Thune plans to make the chamber vote as soon as Thursday for the seventh time on both the Republican stopgap and the Democratic alternative, which would run through Oct. 31 and force Republicans’ hands with health care concessions and guardrails around spending. The same, failed outcome for each bill is all but guaranteed.
“You’ve got to ask our Democratic colleagues,” said Sen. Mike Rounds (R-S.D.) when asked if he expected a different result.
A bipartisan group of senators are having conversations about what could happen once the government reopens as far as the fate of the ACA credits and the appropriations process, but so far those talks have not garnered enough Democratic support.
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