For the fourth time in five months, lawmakers are staring down the barrel of another possible shutdown of the federal government, this time a partial shuttering that would start Saturday.
Coming off a two-week break, senators landed back in Washington on Monday, and House lawmakers are set to arrive Wednesday evening, with just two days to spare before the deadline to keep open departments including Agriculture, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development.
After a meeting Tuesday between President Joe Biden and the top Democratic and Republican leaders, there were signs of progress, though no concrete breakthroughs were publicly announced.
“We’re making good progress, and we’re hopeful we can get this done really quickly,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) told reporters at the White House.
Schumer’s House counterpart, Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), said he was “very optimistic” a deal could be reached to keep open the agencies that are at risk of being shut down.
“We believe that we can get to agreement on these issues and prevent a government shutdown. And that’s our first responsibility,” Johnson said.
Though Democrats and Republicans in the Senate are generally on board with avoiding a partial government shutdown, House Republicans will again be the wild card as the hard-liners among them are itching for a fight over border policy and the still-green Johnson, who has been speaker only since October, may face a choice between placating them and saving his job.
The House Freedom Caucus, a collection of the Republican Party’s most conservative and libertarian members in the House, issued a list of disputed spending items in the annual funding bills that it said Republicans should stand up for before voting to again keep the government open.
Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) has been among the most vocal in threatening a shutdown to win concessions from Democrats. He accused party leaders of not fighting hard enough in a series of social…
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