Speaking in a powerful interview as the shutdown ground on through its fifth week on Tuesday, November 4, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) described how he and the Republicans are trying to outflank and outmaneuver Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and other Democrats in their party’s Congressional leadership to end the shutdown.
As background, the shutdown began on October 1 because the Senate was unable to come up with a spending package that 60 senators could sign on to, with Republicans alleging that the fault lies with the Democrats for pushing crazy spending proposals like taxpayer-funded healthcare for illegal aliens, which Republicans will never sign onto.
With the shutdown continuing to grind on and on despite Republicans putting forward a “clean” continuing resolution, meaning one that is devoid of partisan spending, the GOP leadership is now trying to end the shutdown by appealing to just a few moderate Democrats rather than trying to negotiate with the party as a whole.
Such is what Speaker Johnson said in a speech given from the Capitol, saying that he and the Republicans are trying to “go above the heads” of Schumer, and, as such, are calling on all moderate Democratic senators who are willing to “do the right thing” for the American people by voting to end the shutdown.
Commenting on that matter, the Speaker explained, “Evidence speaks for itself. So we’re going above the heads of the so-called leadership, and we are appealing to the consciences of a handful of people in the Senate who want to do the right thing and just stop the pain—stop the pain for the American people.”
Adding to that, the Speaker explained that this is the longest shutdown in history and that it is “sickening” that Democrats are turning it into such a spectacle, saying, “It may be that the longest shutdown in history is something they can claim as some sort of success. But it’s sickening. It’s sickening to see a political game being played. We’re not playing a game here. We never were.”
Further commenting on how the left has refused to vote for the clean Continuing Resolution, Speaker Johnson said, “It’s 24 pages in length and had not a single Republican priority on it. Why? Because we did it in good faith, because we didn’t want this eventuality to occur. We knew it would be too painful for the people.”
"*" indicates required fields
Watch him here:
It remains to be seen if the Speaker and Republicans generally can get Democrats to switch sides and vote with the GOP to pass the CR and end the shutdown. While a few, like Sen. John Fetterman (D-PA), are willing to work with Republicans to end it, most are not, and so long as the filibuster remains intact, it does not appear that there are enough Democrat votes to end the shutdown.
Sen. Fetterman, for his part, admitted that the Democratic Party is at fault for the shutdown. Commenting on that during an interview, he said, “And like I said, to all of the viewers, I’m apologizing that we can’t even get our sh*t together and just open up our government.”
Featured image credit: screengrab from the embedded video