AP — WASHINGTON — Friday, the White House instructed federal agencies to prepare for a government shutdown, as House Republicans left for the weekend without a viable plan to keep the government funded and prevent a politically and economically costly disruption of federal services.
Unless Speaker Kevin McCarthy can convince his rebellious hard-right faction of Republicans to allow Congress to approve a temporary funding measure to prevent closures while negotiations continue, a government shutdown appears imminent after September 30. Instead, he has initiated a much more ambitious plan to begin passing multiple funding measures as soon as the House returns on Tuesday, with only five days to resolve the impasse.
McCarthy, R-California, told reporters at the Capitol, “We’ve got members working, and hopefully we’ll be able to pass these bills on Tuesday.”
McCarthy signaled his desire to avoid a shutdown, but the hard-right faction of his House majority has effectively assumed control. “I still believe that if you shut down, you’re in a weaker position,” he said.
The impasse with House Republicans over government funding threatens a variety of activities, such as pay for the military and law enforcement personnel, food safety and food assistance programs, air travel, and passport processing, and could devastate the U.S. economy.
The press secretary of the White House, Karine Jean-Pierre, stated on Friday that Republicans would be to blame if federal workers went unpaid. She stated, “Our message is that this does not have to occur.” “They can do their job and keep these vital programs continuing, keeping the government open.”
With the start of the new fiscal year on October 1 and no funding in place, the Office of Management and Budget of the Biden administration began advising federal agencies to review and revise their shutdown plans, according to an OMB official. The beginning of this procedure suggests that federal employees may be informed of their furlough status next week.
President Joe Biden has been fast to blame House Republicans for the impending shutdown, citing their insistence on spending cuts beyond those outlined in a June agreement that suspended the legal borrowing limit until early 2025.
“They’re back at it again, breaking their commitment, threatening more cuts, and threatening to shut down the government again,” Biden said in a recent speech in a Maryland suburb.
Another Government Shutdown?
A handful of hard-right conservatives in McCarthy’s caucus exert enormous pressure on him to enact draconian spending cutbacks, effectively jeopardizing his ability to lead the chamber. Many on the right flank support Donald Trump, the leading Republican candidate to challenge Biden in the 2024 election. They opposed the budget agreement that the speaker reached with Vice President Biden earlier this year and are now attempting to dismantle it.
Trump has urged House Republicans to maintain their opposition to federal expenditure.
In a public rebuke of the speaker, the right faction, led by Trump ally Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Florida, has effectively seized control of the House debate.
Late on Thursday, the hard-right faction urged McCarthy to consider their proposal to shelve plans for a continuing resolution (CR) and instead begin bringing up the 12 individual measures required to fund the government.
The House GOP leadership then announced that it would begin processing a package of four measures to fund the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security, State and Foreign Operations, and Agriculture on Tuesday, when lawmakers return. The same conservatives who now demand passage impeded the progress of certain measures.
“Any progress we make is despite McCarthy, not because of him,” Gaetz wrote on social media, mocking the speaker for sending legislators home for the weekend. “Abjectly pitiful.”
As they pursue substantial reductions and cuts, Gaetz and his allies say they want the House to engage in the difficult work of legislating, even if it leads to a government closure.
The House Rules Committee held a session on Friday afternoon to begin preparing these measures, which would have required weeks of floor debate and hundreds of amendments in the past but will now be rushed to the floor for votes next week. The panel was anticipated to conclude its work on Saturday.
It’s a capstone to a difficult week for McCarthy who sought, unsuccessfully, to advance a typically popular defense spending bill that was twice defeated in embarrassing floor votes. The speaker appeared to attribute the bill’s failure to fellow legislators “who just want to burn the whole place down.”
McCarthy’s closest allies, including Rep. Garrett Graves (R-Louisiana), insisted on Friday that they were still working toward both ends in time to prevent a shutdown: passing annual funding bills and pushing for the most conservative stopgap CR with border security provisions.
When Congress and the president fail to pass a set of 12 funding bills or a temporary measure to keep the government operating, a shutdown occurs. Therefore, federal agencies are required to cease all non-essential activities. There have been 22 funding vacancies since 1976, with ten of them resulting in furloughs.
The longest shutdown on record lasted 35 days during Trump’s presidency, between 2018 and 2019, as he demanded funding to construct a wall along the southern frontier of the United States, which Democrats and some Republicans refused.
Because some agencies had already received funding approval, the closure was only partial. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that it cost the U.S. economy $3 billion. In 2019, $3 billion accounted for only 0.02% of the United States’ economic activity.
There may be costs to certain sectors of the economy and hardships for individuals.
During the closure, the military and law enforcement officials would go unpaid. The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s calamity relief fund could be depleted, causing harm to victims of wildfires, hurricanes, tornadoes, and flooding.
New prescription drug clinical trials could be delayed. Ten thousand children could lose access to care through Head Start, and there would be a backlog in environmental and food safety inspections.
Nearly 7 million expectant women, mothers, and infants and children could lose access to food assistance under the Women, Infants, and Children program.
The majority of air traffic controllers continued to work without pay during the previous closure, according to Brian Gardner, chief Washington strategist for the investment firm Stifel. When the government is closed, visa and passport applications will not be processed, he said.