An optimist might say that the 118th Congress has been lucky so far. Despite the seemingly perpetual threat of a government shutdown that has permeated the past legislative year, lawmakers have time and time again managed to narrowly snatch victory — or at least budgetary detente — from the jaws of defeat. They’ve staved off the political and material harm that traditionally accompanies a federal freeze. But luck, like all good things, must eventually end.
This week, Congress once again finds itself locked in a fierce budget battle, with funding for the departments of Labor, Defense, State, Health and Human Services, and Homeland Security set to expire at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday. As in previous budget battles, a major point of contention between congressional Republicans and President Joe Biden has been the White House’s immigration policies and funding for the Department of Homeland Security. This past weekend, otherwise productive negotiations between Congress and the administration broke down as disagreements over border policy proved once again to be a “key fault line” between the parties, The Washington Post said, stymying plans to release the negotiated budget bills on Sunday afternoon.
With time running out before millions of federal employees — including active duty troops, IRS workers, and TSA agents — feel the impact of a shutdown, the predominant thing crossing the congressional aisle lately has been blame. While Democrats and Republicans can agree that the border is the epicenter of their current battle, that seems to be all they can agree on. Has Washington’s shutdown luck finally run out?
‘Sow chaos on the border ahead of November’
Of all the remaining appropriations bills left to pass before this weekend’s deadline, the DHS funding is the “thorniest of the six,” Politico said, framing the dynamic as a “stop us if you’ve heard this before” situation. Democrats have been quick to accuse Republicans of “playing politics” with the DHS funding, to “sow chaos on the border ahead of November,” one White House official told the outlet, alleging Republicans “rejected a Democratic offer to funnel $1.56 billion in additional funding to secure the border.”
Aside from the Homeland Security funding “hangup,” the “other contentious issues have been resolved” Punchbowl News said, with the White House operating from a presumptive place of power “due to Republicans killing the bipartisan Senate border deal recently.” Congress now is under a serious “time crunch in avoiding a shutdown” Punchbowl continued. Republican leadership’s vow to “give lawmakers 72 hours to review the minibus package before a floor vote” could ultimately mean lawmakers might “stumble into a shutdown.”
House Republicans “wanted a lot more money in the allocations,” one Senate Democratic source involved in the negotiations told The Hill last week, before this weekend’s collapse. Now, however, “they don’t want to spend it because it might make things better, and they don’t want to make things better.”
Republicans were prepared to fund DHS at “roughly the same level” for the remainder of this fiscal year as last year, The Washington Post said, noting that “due to inflation, that would represent a significant funding cut in real terms.” Coupled with the White House’s last-minute ask for “an extra $1.56 billion in border-related resources,” this led to Sunday’s breakdown, Roll Call said.
‘Not a blank check’
Republicans have pushed back on allegations that they were responsible for Sunday’s negotiation breakdown. Republicans have “always said we will provide all the resources necessary for enforcement, but not a blank check to simply ‘manage’ people into the country and bail out sanctuary cities,” one senior GOP aide said to the Washington Examiner.
Democratic efforts to portray Republicans as wanting to “underfund DHS” are “misleading and counterproductive to reaching a bipartisan agreement to avoid a government shutdown,” Raj Shah, Deputy Chief of Staff to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told The Hill.
Republicans reportedly have been pushing in part to allocate more funds directly to border patrol agents, while the White House has demanded the bill “preserve funding for detention facilities to house unauthorized migrants,” The Washington Post said. There may nevertheless “be a breakthrough in sight,” Semafor said, citing reports that negotiators have begun working on “a full-year spending bill,” rather than a continuing resolution.