Congress closing in on shutdown deadline with no clear plan

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: The Hill

by Aris Folley - 02/18/25 6:00 AM ET


Congress is struggling to strike a deal to keep the government funded as a looming deadline to prevent a shutdown next month gets closer. Lawmakers are less than a month away from a mid-March date to pass legislation to prevent a funding lapse — or risk the first shutdown in years. “We can’t have precisely the same kind of deal we had before, and we’re trying to work to find some common ground,” House Appropriations Committee Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said shortly before the House left for a one-week recess this week.

Negotiators on both sides have been working to strike a spending deal for weeks, with hopes of crafting the 12 annual funding bills that could make it out of both chambers with bipartisan support — and across President Trump’s desk for signature. But they also say the task has gotten more difficult as fallout spreads over a sweeping operation undertaken by the Trump administration to reshape the federal government.

“We cannot come to a deal where you hammer out gains, losses, but you come to a conclusion and you come to a meeting of the minds,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), the top Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, told reporters. “That should not be subject to some third party deciding that that’s not what they want.” “We had a deal last year, all of us and so forth, and then there was an interloper with no authority, no legitimacy, nonelected, who said, ‘Don’t vote for it,’” DeLauro said, as Democrats have continued to zero in on tech billionaire Elon Musk, the head of Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).

DeLauro and Cole have both continued to press for a deal on a top-line agreement on how much to fund the government for fiscal 2025 — a key step to kick off work on hashing out annual funding bills. But there is growing acknowledgement that a stopgap of some kind is necessary as Congress hurtles toward a March 14 deadline to keep the lights on with no clear plan on how to prevent a funding lapse.

Read more: https://thehill.com/business/budget/5149928-congress-struggles-government-funding-shutdown/

[OrlandoDem2]

1. If Democrats vote for the deal then they better extract massive concessions.

If not, then let it burn. Shut it down. The GOP controls everything. Make them do it if they won’t play ball.

[slightlv]

8. "let it burn".... actually, I'm with you.

Musk and trump are already on the way to doing that, anyway... without even the cover of a government shutdown! Make them own it.

[forgotmylogin]

15. Yep. Commander in Thief wants no government.

That makes him the king.

[DENVERPOPS]

21. Beware the Ides of March........NC

[samnsara]

23. im with you. My two reps are Cantwell and Murray..

..im contacting both to NOT help out the repugs..that we are OK with it shutting down for awhile.

[BoRaGard]

2. "No plan is The Plan. Heh heh. Suckers." - G.O.P.

"Chaos is what we want. Then we get our boots on for real, suckers." - G.O.P.

[DENVERPOPS]

22. Actually

then they get on their....... "JACK BOOTS"

[Zorro]

27. The GOP WANTS a shutdown

It gives Trump another opportunity to dismiss more government workers.

[ck4829]

3. "First shutdown in years"? - Ah right, the one where there was a Republican trifecta just like last time?

[BumRushDaShow]

4. And that particular one

was the LONGEST in history (35 days IIRC).

[slightlv]

9. This one won't conclude with Fed workers

being paid back for all the time they lose on the job, either. Completely new mindset in DC now... and it's workers be damned.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. Congress DID actually pass a law requiring back pay (believe it or not)

S.24 - Government Employee Fair Treatment Act of 2019

Public Law 116-1
116th Congress

An Act



To provide for the compensation of Federal and other government
employees affected by lapses in appropriations. ((NOTE: Jan. 16,
2019 - [S. 24]))

Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the
United States of America in Congress assembled, ((NOTE: Government
Employee Fair Treatment Act of 2019.))
SECTION 1. ((NOTE: 31 USC 1301 note.)) SHORT TITLE.

This Act may be cited as the ``Government Employee Fair Treatment
Act of 2019''.
SEC. 2. COMPENSATION FOR FEDERAL AND OTHER GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEES
AFFECTED BY A LAPSE IN APPROPRIATIONS.

(snip)

(never thought I'd see the day after all these years)

[slightlv]

12. May be... but we're not on a level playing field here...

trump and musk will just ignore the law. He's got full "executive office immunity", you see.... I don't trust trump to play by ANY rules, and given his history in SA, I certainly don't trust musk. He's an illegal alien. He came in one type of visa, never showed up for classes, and lived here as though he had a business visa. I say deport musk. But I say the two of them together will ignore any law, any precedent, any ruling they don't agree with. And it seems NO ONE can make them do otherwise.

[BumRushDaShow]

14. We will ultimately have to see what the SCOTUS does

with the monster that John Roberts has created and unleashed.

I don't think they are ready to lose their jobs just yet.

Am thinking of the lessons learned when the Israeli Executive Branch was attempting to goad the Knesset into usurping and disemboweling their Judiciary - Israel’s Supreme Court overturns a key component of Netanyahu’s polarizing judicial overhaul

Will have to watch for something similar here.

[slightlv]

19. I remember the Israeli example you give...

I also remembering that it could never happen here. Everyone is too chicken shi* to do anything about it. I hope I'm wrong and just having a demoralizing evening... but someone standing up to trump? I sure don't put it in this SCOTUS' to do list.

[Lovie777]

5. Well they don't have many paychecks to dish out with all the firing...............

the agencies, departments are barely doing anything useful with all cuts, defunding, and stealing, while fucking up the data.

[bucolic_frolic]

6. Democrats should not cooperate in my opinion. Shut it down, voters need to feel the pain

of what they did. I know, it hurts all and some heavily, and the most vulnerable a lot, but we are being played with this Musk Audit disguised as an efficiency crusade.

[OldBaldy1701E]

24. It doesn't have to 'hurt a lot'.

We can step up and help each other survive. We can combine our resources to make sure we all get through this. And then, when they see that they cannot stop us from resisting, we might get some respBBWWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!

(Knew I could not get through that with a straight face.)

We will never get though this and maintain anything like the promise of our Constitution without dropping this business head mentality we have. The 'I got mine, screw you' crowd, which are on both sides of the aisle, will never allow us to be that community minded ever again. Until we understand that this attitude is never going to allow any meaningful general support, we will just be talking about sticking together, but we don't really mean it.

Two things are going to get us through this. Effort (with no thought of reward) and Sacrifice. Which means, we are in big trouble, as both of those are 'anti-American'!

[Journeyman]

7. No, no -- not "Congress." REPUBLICANS have no clear plan. For Democrats its simple . . .

sit back and let the Republicans implode.

[KPN]

26. Except their plan is to always blame it/everything on Democrats and they have had a lot of success with that

because the media largely is controlled by or favors them. We will get blamed regardless.

[Mawspam2]

11. You can't deal with these lying felons. Don't try.

It's all on them. Let them own it. When MAGAts checks don't come, and all federal employees are fired, so they never come again, too bad.

[Irish_Dem]

13. What the H are they talking about? Trump is firing the federal work force.

A lot less paychecks to fund.

[moonshinegnomie]

16. Shut it down

Shut it all down. Unless the gop gives massive and I do mean massive concessions. And if they balk then shut it all down

[mwooldri]

17. well the House Speaker is a Right Johnson.

It's all fine and dandy having some Democrats trying to get something out of this. But one simple fact temains. The MAGA party have the majority. It's their watch, their call.

Any government shutdown is on MAGA. Not Democrats.

[littlemissmartypants]

18. Common ground is bullsh¡t. ...

The regime cannot be trusted to follow the law.

There is no way to find this so-called "common ground" so why join the masquerade?

Shut it down. Make the regime own the bullsh¡t.

[bluedigger]

20. Turn the lights off at the White House.

No business concerning the public welfare is being conducted there.

[Martin68]

25. At this point, default on the US debt is the least of our problems. I say let them default and hang that around

Trump's fat neck.