WASHINGTON (AP) — Visits to the Capitol are at a standstill. The House is keeping its doors closed, while the Senate repeated its loop of failed votes Wednesday to reopen the government. President Donald Trump is threatening mass layoffs of federal employees and withholding back pay for the rest.
As the government shutdown has entered its second week, no discernible endgame is in sight.
“Congress, do your damn job,” Randy Erwin, president of the National Federation of Federal Employees, said with other top union leaders near the Capitol.
No negotiations, at least publicly, are underway, but discreet talks are emerging behind the scenes. Groups of lawmakers, Republicans and Democrats, are meeting privately, seeking ways to break the impasse, which hinges on reaching a deal to preserve health care subsidies.
The signs of discomfort are evident: military personnel and federal employees are at risk of not receiving their salaries, flights are being delayed at airports across the country, and federal programs are being disrupted. Clashes broke out at the Capitol.
Two dueling bills, one from Republicans and one from Democrats, failed again in the Senate.
The shutdown continues and tempers are heating up
Republicans who hold the majority in Congress believe they have the political advantage as they fend off Democrats’ demands to quickly fund health insurance subsidies as part of any plan to end the shutdown.
House Speaker Mike Johnson seems so confident that he’s preparing to take live questions from callers on C-SPAN’s public affairs show Thursday morning.
But Democrats also weighed in, confident that Americans are with them in the fight to prevent the looming surge in health care prices and blaming Trump for the shutdown.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer insisted it’s Republicans who are “feeling the heat.”
Tensions came to a boil on Wednesday.
Outside the president’s office, Arizona’s two Democratic senators demanded that Johnson reopen the House to swear in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva. She won a special election for the Tucson-area state seat last month and said she would agree to release records on sex trafficking investigations into Jeffrey Epstein, but has not yet served in Congress.
Johnson, facing a diminished Republican majority once the new Democrat takes office, refused.
Shortly after, House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York was confronted by home state Republican Rep. Mike Lawler. It demanded the leader’s support for a one-year extension of expiring health care subsidies, as Democrats pushed for a better deal. The meeting quickly degenerated.
“You shut down the government,” Lawler railed.
“You’re embarrassing yourself,” Jeffries retorted.
The health insurance of millions of people is at stake
At its core, the debate centers on the health care issue that has embroiled Congress for years, and in particular the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, which Trump unsuccessfully tried to repeal and replace during his first term in the White House.
Congress increased federal subsidies that help people buy private insurance policies on the Affordable Care Act exchanges during the COVID-19 pandemic. The federal aid was popular and helped increase ACA enrollment to a record 24 million people. These enhanced grants are set to expire at the end of the year.
Republicans say Congress can address the health insurance issue in the coming months. Democrats are fighting to fix the problem now, as people receive notices of higher policy rates in the new year.
Two prominent Republicans, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia and Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri, have left their party, saying something needs to be done to help Americans pay for upcoming health insurance rate hikes.
Trump wants health care deal
A loose group of senators, Republicans and Democrats, discussed options for solving the health insurance problem. Some of them met over a Thai dinner.
Republican Sen. Susan Collins of Maine has proposed her own plan to restart negotiations. That means reopening government now, but with a “commitment,” she said, to discussing the health care issue.
Another option proposed by Republican Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, a former governor of the state, is a temporary extension of the subsidies, for a year, then phased out.
And Trump himself has indicated he is open to negotiating with Democrats on their demands to save health care subsidies. Earlier this week, the president said negotiations were already underway because he wanted “good health care” for people, only to change his tone hours later to say the government needed to reopen first.
“I’m pretty discouraged,” Rounds said Wednesday. “I feel like it’s probably past the point of doing anything.”
Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., sounded a similarly sour note.
“I’m optimistic, but wow, we’re not making a lot of progress,” Coons said.
But Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, close to Trump, said, “There’s always a group that talks.”
Missed paychecks for workers and more missed votes
While federal employees have often missed pay during shutdowns, Trump is now threatening to eliminate guaranteed back pay, which would be a drastic change from normal. The White House budget office, led by Russ Vought, says the law says back pay is not automatic and that Congress would have to approve it.
Union leaders warned Trump against using federal workers as “political pawns” in political brawling.
“And President, you better start obeying the Constitution,” Erwin said.
Part of the reason parties are so reluctant to abandon their positions is that their internal data encourages them not to give in.
Senate Democrats have been briefed on reports suggesting their health care messages are resonating with voters. A memo from the Senate majority PAC was also distributed Tuesday to House Democrats and campaigns across the country, with a clear directive: stay the course.
The Republicans, for their part, are sticking to their own strategy. A memo from the House GOP campaign arm urged candidates to focus on the economic impact of the shutdown, including a district-level breakdown of people who would be affected by a government shutdown.
Each camp has framed the fight against the gridlock as a precursor to the 2026 midterm elections.
