President Biden challenged Americans to stop electing Republicans if the government threatens to shut down next weekend.
“Funding the government is one of the most basic, fundamental responsibilities of Congress and if House Republicans don’t start doing their job, we have to stop electing them,” Biden said in a speech at the White House House.
The government will run out of money on September 30 if the House and Senate cannot agree on spending legislation to send to the president’s desk.
The president pointed to the debt ceiling agreement he struck with Speaker Kevin McCarthy, which set funding ceilings for the 2024 fiscal year.
But the deal agitated some conservatives in the House of Representatives, who demanded McCarthy write 12 separate spending bills at lower ceilings than those agreed to in the debt ceiling legislation.
“A small group of extreme Republicans in the House of Representatives don’t want to honor that deal, and everyone in America should pay a price for that,” he said. ‘We have made a deal. We shake hands. “We said this is what we’re going to do and now they’re backing out of the deal, which isn’t much of a surprise these days.”
President Biden challenged Americans to stop electing Republicans if the government threatens to shut down next weekend
The president pointed to the debt ceiling agreement he struck with Speaker Kevin McCarthy, which set funding ceilings for the 2024 fiscal year.
Democrats have launched a massive campaign to blame Republicans for the government shutdown.
Previously, the Biden campaign accused Republicans in the House of Representatives of “gleefully allowing Donald Trump to function as their chief political strategist at the expense of American families.”
Five days before the government shutdown, it is not clear whether the House of Representatives is any closer to a spending agreement than it was last week.
Last week, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., warned that shutdowns have “always been a loser for Republicans politically” and that they have “never resulted in a policy change.”
Speaker Kevin McCarthy is expected to take another gamble with a rule vote that would advance four separate spending bills on Tuesday, though it is far from clear the rule will pass.
The speaker would have to flip five Republican holdouts who voted no last week on a line vote for the defense spending bill, a line vote that failed twice within 48 hours.
The line vote that kicks off debate on spending bills typically passes with the support of almost everyone in the majority party. But the House Republican Party has struggled to pass a regulatory vote three times this year.
The rulemaking vote for the military, the Departments of Homeland Security, State and Agriculture on Tuesday evening will raise the temperature for how the rest of the week could play out for Republicans in the House of Representatives.
Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., has already said she is a “hard no” to the rule because it includes “blood money” for Ukraine.
McCarthy had said he would cut $300 million from the defense spending bill to train Ukrainian soldiers and hold a separate vote on it on Friday. But he did an about-face and decided to leave the money in their country, realizing it would be too difficult to remove that and Ukraine’s funding from the State Department’s funding bill.
The Republican Party’s other “no” votes include Reps. Andy Biggs (Ariz.), Eli Crane (Ariz.), Matt Rosendale (Mont.) and Dan Bishop (NC) and it is not clear if any changed their minds this week. .
Even if they can start a debate on the bills, it is far from clear that they will actually be able to pass them.
And if all twelve appropriations bills were to pass the House of Representatives, which is a monumental achievement in itself, the government would still be shut down because the Senate would never take up and pass these bills on Saturday night.
Meanwhile, McCarthy is moving ahead with a Republican-only continuing resolution (CR) that would keep the government open and give his conference more time to push through spending bills.
The Senate, meanwhile, is preparing a bill that could advance a Democratic-led CR and put pressure on McCarthy to bring it to the table.
And moderates in the House of Representatives have begun preparing their own bipartisan CR plans and looking for ways to advance them without the blessing of leadership. Some moderate Republicans have said they would join Democrats in a discharge request, meaning they could force a CR vote on the floor if five Republicans and all Democrats agree.
McCarthy has urged his colleagues to fight a shutdown, even as some appear open to shutting down the government to get what they want. Trump called on Republicans on Truth Social Sunday: “Unless you get everything, then shut it down!”
‘You have to keep the government open. I mean, if people want to shut down the government, it just makes them weaker,” McCarthy said.
“Why would they want to stop paying the troops or stop paying the border agents or the Coast Guard? I don’t understand how that makes you stronger. I don’t understand what point you’re trying to make.’