A week ago, Senate Majority Leader Mitch “Moscow” McConnell said that he was on board with passing a temporary government spending bill known as a “continuing resolution or “C.R.” before the end of September to avert another shutdown. These types of bills become necessary when the Appropriations Committees of the House and Senate cannot agree among themselves or with each other on funding levels or priorities and the spending approved by Congress threatens to run out.
It’s often the case that the Appropriations Committees are able to agree to some spending bills (commonly including Defense) but not others. When this happens, it’s leads to either a “partial” C.R. or a “partial” governmental shutdown. At least for September, McConnell doesn’t seem interested in another shutdown, but last week he seemed optimistic that at least some of the Appropriations bills would pass this month.
“A major focus of the Senate this month will be moving forward as many of the regular appropriations bills as possible and then passing a temporary continuing resolution for the outstanding parts of the government before the end of September,” McConnell said on the Senate floor [last] Monday.
But things are not looking good on that front. Right before the August recess, the Senate agreed on a two-year budget. That set the overall level of spending, but now they must decide how big a slice of that pie each department of government will receive. The Republicans are not in the strongest position. While they control the Senate and the White House, the Democrats can filibuster spending bills in the Senate and they control the House of Representatives. There is no way around the need to arrive at a compromise. Compromise is not the GOP’s strength.
“I’m praying for Chairman [Richard] Shelby [of Alabama] and ranking member [Patrick] Leahy [of Vermont] that the curtains will part here and we’ll figure a way to move forward,” said McConnell, who is also a member of the Appropriations Committee.
But a quick resolution is nowhere in sight with senators at a stalemate over major provisions, including the top-line spending figures for each of the bills, known as 302(b)s.
Last Thursday, the Senate Appropriations Committee did manage to agree (on a party-line vote) to spending levels for two of the bills: Defense and Energy. But those bills have no chance of surviving a filibuster on the full floor of the Senate because the Democrats are insisting that the 302(b) issue be resolved in its entirety before consenting to any part of the appropriations process.
Democrats are making it clear they won’t provide Republicans with the votes unless they sit down and renegotiate the spending legislation.
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said he thought Republicans “pulled the rug out from under us.”
“They’ve got to realize the mistake they made. They’ve made a tactical error, and it won’t be the first time that a majority party has had to correct itself,” he said.
Asked if any spending bills could pass on the floor, he added, “Absolutely not.”
“You had every member of the Democratic caucus voting ‘no’” in committee, he said. “I think we’ve got to renegotiate the allocations, and if we negotiate the allocations we can move forward.”
There’s really no time left to do much more than give up and pass a continuing resolution which will keep funding levels at the same level of the current fiscal year. Most likely, that C.R. will keep the government operating until just before the Thanksgiving recess. The idea being that the prospect of leaving town with the government shuttered will be unpalatable enough to force concessions from both sides.
That added pressure might help, but it’s doubtful it will be enough. To begin with, Trump stole money to pay for border wall construction and the Republicans want to replace it. The Democrats are not on board with that, nor with the overall spending levels under discussion for the Department of Homeland Security which they consider to be another proxy for Trump’s wall. There are other areas of contention, including abortion, that will not be easily resolved.
Not all government shutdowns are created equal. The last one was a “partial” because Congress had actually passed five of the thirteen appropriations bills, so much of the government was still operational. The coming Thanksgiving shutdown looks to be total, or nearly so. Given that we’re not unlikely to be knee-deep in a region-wide military conflagration with Iran by then, it’s doubtful that the Defense bill will be held up, but the rest of the departments will probably be out of money. That means the government shutdown will be more disruptive this year than last.
You can add this to the list of things (including disruption of fuel supplies) that are going to damage the economy is the coming months.
If we are doing the heavy lifting in fighting a Saudi-Israeli War against Iran while every other department but “Defense” is shut down, that would be the fondest dream of “conservatism”! Would that be Peak Militarism? Even the Kaiser kept the trains running during the First World War!
One would hope that Dems would hold the Repubs’ feet to the fire over their acquiescence (if not encouragement of) Der Trumper’s unconstitutional “Defense” revenue grab to fund his Wall, but sadly it’s the kind of issue the Mommy Party usually caves to Daddy on. Will Der Trumper jump in to claim ownership of the shutdown as last time? And will he steal funds from Defense to keep the airports running this time? Pile it all on Failed State Mountain, haha!
In the “Conservative” Era, government operations that used to be routine become simply impossible. Dysfunction reigns supreme. The Repub senate, under the leadership of the Gravedigger of Democracy, does absolutely nothing other than stalemate over cut-and-dried budget legislation, while the crises mount all around us, from climate change to rightwing domestic terrorism to foreign interference in elections. Arguably it’s exactly what “the people” want, as the solution to the dysfunction is so blindingly obvious that a below-average IQ 10 year old can easily deduce it–yet the American people, in all their collective “wisdom”, cannot….
Umm perhaps Trump should be required to ask permission before starting another war? Sorta what the constitution says anyway or no funding and oh yeah fuck the back fill. You stole it, you replace it Mr President.
The H of R needs to do something about his reallocation of Defense spending to the border. Apparently there are no limits to tax cuts for the wealthy or the military budget.
Why not demand elimination of the debt limit? Too hard? Why?