Shutdown enters second week with no breakthrough in sight– www.washingtonexaminer.com
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Excerpt:
The government shutdown entered its second week on Monday as a solution to Washington’s gridlock over the federal budget continues to elude lawmakers.
The Senate is set to vote on a “clean” continuing resolution, or CR, on Monday evening that would keep the government funded at its current levels until late November. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) will need to pick up five Democratic votes to pass the measure. That means the stopgap spending bill will likely not advance, as only three lawmakers in the Democratic caucus have crossed the aisle, with no others announcing plans to join Republicans over the weekend.
On the House side, Republicans have refused to budge on hashing out another deal viewed more favorably by Democrats. House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has argued Democrats have backed similar “clean” CRs keeping the government open over a dozen times in recent years. Johnson has argued that concerns that the latest measure doesn’t contain provisions extending Obamacare subsidies, which have led Democrats to block the CR, are nothing more than a political ploy designed to appease fringe elements in the party opposed to President Donald Trump’s GOP.
Johnson sent his conference home in an attempt to push Democrats to the table, saying the chamber had already done its job when it passed the funding bill and sent it to the Senate on Sept. 19. Members are on a “district work period” in their home states until Oct. 13. They are scheduled to return to Washington on Oct. 14.