Congress
House eyes Friday vote on stopgap as partisan tensions flare
Republican leaders vowed Wednesday to barrel forward with a stopgap funding bill in the coming days as Democrats threatened to oppose it in favor of their own alternative — raising the chances for an Oct. 1 government shutdown.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told reporters Wednesday morning that a vote on the GOP-written bill unveiled Tuesday is expected “likely Friday” amid Democratic objections about a lack of bipartisan negotiations.
“We’re going to do our job, and that’s all we can do, is do our job,” he said. “If Democrats want to shut the government down and continue to hold America hostage because they don’t like the results of the election, the American people are fed up with that kind of childish politics.”
While House GOP leaders have pushed their members for earlier action, they believe Friday morning is the likeliest option for the vote. Hard-liners and others are pushing leaders to stick to the chamber’s 72-hour-review rule.
GOP leaders are also still working to win the votes of several undecided Republicans, including Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), but are confident they are on track to pass the measure by the end of the week. “Like any big vote, they’re always tight,” Scalise said Wednesday.
Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.), chair of the hard-right House Freedom Caucus, said in a brief interview he was expecting a “Friday morning” vote, saying that was “close enough” to fulfilling the 72-hour rule. GOP leaders have privately acknowledged a Thursday vote could cost them votes among hard-liners, and they can’t afford to lose many Republicans with Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) already a hard “no.”
“I suspect leadership knows it’s easier to get guys to a yes when we’re following the rules than not,” said another Republican involved in the conversations granted anonymity to speak candidly.
Senate Republicans, who want to act quickly on the House bill, are closely watching the House action as they plan their own schedule.
If the House votes Friday, the earliest the Senate would be able to vote is Monday. While voting on Thursday could theoretically move up that schedule a day, a number of Republican senators want to attend activist Charlie Kirk’s funeral Sunday, making a vote that day unlikely.
Furthermore, according to two people granted anonymity to discuss chamber scheduling, senators are not eager to return Monday only to leave again for an already scheduled recess for Rosh Hashanah. Instead, senators would likely return next Thursday, after the Jewish holiday, the people said.
The scheduling conflicts come as the Sept. 30 funding expiration looms and as Senate Democrats threaten to use the chamber’s filibuster rule to block the GOP stopgap.
“In the Senate, it takes 60 votes,” Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday. “So that means Republicans will need to work with us. If they can’t even bother to have a conversation with Democrats, then it’s Republicans who the American people will know are causing a shutdown in two weeks.”
Senate Majority Leader John Thune reiterated Wednesday that Republicans see nothing to negotiate on the “clean” stopgap, which would extend current funding through Nov. 21. “These guys are trying to take a hostage here,” he said.
Speaker Mike Johnson, asked about the prospect of Senate Democrats blocking the House stopgap, said in a brief interview Tuesday that he hoped that wouldn’t happen.
“There would be no reason to, because it’s clean and short term.” Asked if he would work on a backup plan in that case, he replied, “We’re going to see what happens.”
But House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole signaled some support Wednesday for Republicans working on a Plan B if Senate Democrats do block the GOP-led stopgap as they’re threatening.
“I certainly would,” Cole said in a brief interview, but he acknowledged it was “a leadership decision.”
Cole, asked if the talks could be salvaged at that point to stave off a shutdown, replied, “I don’t know.”
The comments came as tensions between normally cordial appropriators appear to be reaching a breaking point. Senate Appropriations Vice Chair Patty Murray (D-Wash.) on Tuesday accused Cole of having “pulled out” of bipartisan talks and “produced a one-sided CR.”
“Where are the Republican leaders?” Murray said. “If Republicans can’t even sit down with [Democratic leaders] to simply have a conversation, then they cannot govern.”
Cole retorted Wednesday that Democrats were threatening to oppose a stopgap funding bill “they asked for” and are now planning to unveil their own alternative that adds on health care provisions and other measures GOP leaders are opposing.
“We gave them the time frame and a clean bill, now they’re wanting to put other things in,” he said, adding that health care and other issues Democrats want to tackle “ought to be dealt with in separate discussions.”
Congress
DHS stopgap set for quick House action after Rules Committee vote
The House Rules Committee advanced a measure Friday evening that would fund the entirety of the Homeland Security Department through May 22 — without setting up debate or a separate vote on the funding bill itself.
The panel, after a raucous meeting that devolved into shouting at multiple points, voted 8-4 on party lines to advance the measure to the floor.
The rule includes a “deem and pass” provision, a tactic that allows legislation to be passed by the House automatically once the rule itself is adopted. While there will be one hour of floor debate and a vote on the rule, there will not be a standalone House vote on the DHS spending bill.
Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) described himself as needing “a neck brace” from the whiplash of hearing Republicans argue for hours that the Senate’s early-morning voice vote on a different DHS funding measure was “shameful” for lack of transparency and accountability.
House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) accused the Senate of moving their bill “in the middle of the night, with the smell of jet fumes in the air,” lamenting that the House was left “to take it or leave it.”
House leaders, McGovern suggested, have chosen a similar path by fast-tracking the eight-week DHS stopgap.
“You’re in charge,” he told Rules Chair Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.). “You can do whatever the hell you want to do.”
Congress
Rand Paul weighs a 2028 presidential bid
Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) is considering a bid for president in 2028, as Republicans jockey for the future of the GOP post-Trump.
In a “CBS Sunday Morning” interview airing Sunday, a reporter asked Paul about an article that implied he would be running for president.
“We’re thinking about it,” Paul said. “I would say fifty-fifty,” adding that he would make a final decision after the midterm elections.
Paul ran for the Republican nomination for president in 2016 with a libertarianism-focused campaign but ultimately dropped out after a poor performance in the Iowa caucuses and a shortage of cash. He instead ran for reelection to the Senate.
Paul has had a complex relationship with his own party and with President Donald Trump, often finding himself the lone Republican on certain issues. More recently, he was the only Republican to support a joint resolution that would limit Trump’s war powers in Iran.
His father, former Rep. Ron Paul, also ran for president three times: first as a Libertarian in 1988, and twice as a Republican in 2008 and 2012.
Congress
‘Meltdown’: DHS shutdown set to drag on after House GOP rejects Senate deal
House Republicans moved Friday to further extend the six-week shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security by rejecting a Senate bill that would fund the vast majority of DHS agencies through September.
Instead, Speaker Mike Johnson proposed a temporary extension of DHS funding through May 22 — a plan that has uncertain prospects in the House and certainly won’t pass the Senate before the shutdown becomes the longest funding lapse in U.S. history Saturday.
But Johnson said House Republicans simply could not swallow the Senate bill, which omits funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement as well as Border Patrol and some other parts of Customs and Border Protection.
“The Republicans are not going to be any part of any effort to reopen our borders or to stop immigration enforcement,” he said. “We are going to deport dangerous criminal illegal aliens because it is a basic function of the government. The Democrats fundamentally disagree.”
The move toward an eight-week stopgap creates a tactical gulf between Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who called an end to weeks of abortive bipartisan talks Thursday and pushed through the funding bill in hopes of tacking on funding later for ICE and CBP in a party-line budget reconciliation bill.
President Donald Trump has largely stayed out of the GOP infighting on Capitol Hill, keeping his criticism trained on Democrats. He ordered DHS to pay TSA officers Thursday as long security lines snarls more U.S. airports.
Johnson played down the split with his Senate counterpart, saying the Democratic leader there bore more blame for the impasse.
“I wouldn’t call John Thune the engineer of this,” he said. “Chuck Schumer and the Democrats in the Senate have forced this upon the Senate. I have to protect the House. … Our colleagues on this side understand this is not a game. We are not playing their games.”
Thune said early Friday morning he did not speak directly to Johnson in the final hours leading up to the Senate’s voice vote, but he said they had texted. He acknowledged he did not know in advance how the House would handle the Senate bill.
“Hopefully they’ll be around, and we can get at least a lot of the government opened up again, and then we’ll go from there,” he said.
Johnson made his game plan clear with House Republicans on a private call just minutes before addressing reporters in the Capitol, according to four people granted anonymity to describe the call. He warned that a failure to advance the short-term DHS stopgap would upend GOP plans for a reconciliation bill, the people said.
He suggested the Senate could quickly clear the stopgap measure once it passes the House. Most senators have left Washington for a recess running through April 13, but Johnson said the chamber could approve the House measure by unanimous consent at a planned pro forma session Monday.
But some House Republicans on the private call, including Rep. Carlos Gimenez of Florida, aired doubts it could pass the Senate — or even the House. Some fellow GOP centrists argued that the House should just swallow the Senate bill and end the standoff.
The House plan for a 60-day stopgap won a cold reception in the Senate, with even Republicans warning it will only prolong the partial government shutdown.
The plan is instead fueling frustration among both Republicans and Democrats who view House Republicans as essentially throwing temper tantrum. Three people granted anonymity to speak candidly each described the House as having a “meltdown.”
Schumer publicly slammed the House GOP plan Friday, saying it was “dead on arrival” across the Capitol, “and Republicans know it.”
A Senate GOP aide granted anonymity to speak candidly added that the quickest way to end the shutdown is for the House to pass the Senate bill.
Five people granted anonymity to comment on Senate dynamics said there was no possibility that Democrats would let the House GOP plan pass during the Senate’s brief pro forma sessions over the next two weeks. It would only take one Democratic senator to show up and object to any attempt to pass it.
The bill, according to the five people, also can’t get 60 votes in the Senate once the chamber returns. Democrats have previously rejected even shorter stopgaps, leaving some to privately question why House Republicans would ever think their plan would work.
-
The Dictatorship1 year agoLuigi Mangione acknowledges public support in first official statement since arrest
-
Politics1 year agoFormer ‘Squad’ members launching ‘Bowman and Bush’ YouTube show
-
Politics1 year agoFormer Kentucky AG Daniel Cameron launches Senate bid
-
Politics1 year agoBlue Light News’s Editorial Director Ryan Hutchins speaks at Blue Light News’s 2025 Governors Summit
-
The Dictatorship7 months agoMike Johnson sums up the GOP’s arrogant position on military occupation with two words
-
The Dictatorship1 year agoPete Hegseth’s tenure at the Pentagon goes from bad to worse
-
Uncategorized1 year ago
Bob Good to step down as Freedom Caucus chair this week
-
Politics11 months agoDemocrat challenging Joni Ernst: I want to ‘tear down’ party, ‘build it back up’







