Top Dems accuse GOP of causing shutdown as they vow to vote against government funding bill

Top congressional Democrats are vowing to oppose a GOP spending bill that would temporarily fund the government through mid-November — ratcheting up the likelihood that Democrats will plunge the country into a partial government shutdown.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer issued a joint statement expressing their opposition just hours after House GOP leadership unveiled a stopgap spending bill on Tuesday afternoon. The Democratic leaders accused Republicans of unveiling a partisan spending measure despite the legislation extending government funding at current levels for just seven weeks and providing for new security assistance for members of all three branches of government — funding most Democrats support.

“By refusing to work with Democrats, Republicans are steering our country straight toward a shutdown,” Jeffries and Schumer wrote in the statement. “President [Donald] Trump called the play last week when he told Congressional Republicans to jam a partisan spending bill down the throats of the American people without Democratic support.”

“Instead of governing, Republicans are once again taking orders from Donald Trump, hurting the American people and recklessly marching our nation to the brink of a shutdown,” the top Democrats continued.

The 91-page stopgap bill would fund government operations through Nov. 21, giving congressional appropriators additional time to strike a deal on funding the government through the remainder of the fiscal year. Speaker Mike Johnson has said he wants to vote on the measure as early as Friday, just weeks before the Sept. 30 shutdown deadline.

Republicans can pass the stopgap measure without Democratic support in the House, but will need Democratic votes in the Senate to clear the 60-vote legislative filibuster.

Republicans argue their spending bill has few anomalies, undercutting Democrats’ argument that the measure is partisan. A majority of Democrats also voted for short-term stopgap spending bills, known as continuing resolutions (CRs), under former President Joe Biden.

“What’s to negotiate? It is a clean CR,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune told reporters on Tuesday. “They have had the opportunity to negotiate. There are anomalies in there that the Democrats wanted in there,” the majority leader continued, in a reference to $30 million in security assistance funding for lawmakers.

Thune also slammed Schumer’s calls for bipartisan negotiations on a stopgap spending bill, revealing that the lead Democrat has not personally contacted him.

“He’s suggesting that he would like to have conversations about this,” Thune said on the Senate floor Tuesday. “Well, he knows my office is right down the hall. He knows my phone number.

“I haven’t heard from him,” Thune added.

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