With just over 4 hours left until the government shutdown deadline, following the earlier tabling of the previous bill passed by the House which delayed Obamacare by one year, the House has resumed debates on the Continuing Resolution, which as reported earlier will likely include a one-year delay in the individual mandate, and a measure eliminating some of the benefits that members of Congress and certain members of the executive branch would receive under the ACA.
As was further reported moments ago, Obama called Boehner and McConnell, and reiterated that "he will not negotiate on the debt limit, that Congress must pay the bills it has already incurred and avoid a devastating blow to our economy" adding that he would oppose any "politically-motivated attempts to defund or delay" Obamacare.
In response, Boehner said in a ten minute-long conversation that "Obamacare is costing jobs and that American families are being denied basic fairness when big businesses are getting exemptions that they are not,” according to Boehner's spokesman Brendan Buck. Whether this is the preamble to a clean CR bill, that is the only thing that may provide a quick way out from a government shutdown, will be determined in a few hours when the House finally votes on some proposed bill. Watch the debates on the
In terms of the current strategy, which is obviously changing by the minute, Stone McCarthy [4]has learned that "one new scenario that we've heard today was that after a few days of a shutdown, House leaders would attempt to move a clean CR that would fund government through mid October, around the time Treasury expects to exhaust the extraordinary measures that allow it to create room to issue debt under the current debt ceiling. The thinking here is that Speaker Boehner could get more support for this approach from the Tea Party wing of the party after a few days of backlash from a shutdown. Also, he could offer the possibility of resuming the fight over Obamacare in the context of the need for a debt limit increase. Assuming the government is shut down tomorrow, we expect that the release of the August construction spending data will be postponed. If a shutdown persists for more than a day or two, we expect other releases to be postponed, including Friday's employment report."
Finally, here is the latest from The Hill [5]:
Like sands through the hourglass: Congress is on the brink of forcing a government shutdown, and even at this writing, the chances appear pretty darn good that government workers will get the day off on Tuesday. So, outside of the House and Senate agreeing to a bill that provides a short-term extension of current spending levels, the government will shut down at midnight and remain closed until there's a deal.
There could be some more ping-ponging back and forth across the Capitol, but there's no question that time is ticking away.
The back-and-forth between the chambers and growing chances of a shutdown roiled stock markets on Monday, too.
After the Senate killed amendments on a bill passed by the House late Saturday night, House GOP leaders teed up a stopgap spending measure that would delay the individual mandate of President Obama’s healthcare law for a year.
The plan also would strip out subsidies in the law for members of Congress, their staffs and political appointees.
Votes are expected on Monday night, and with precious hours left before the end of the day, there seemed little reason to expect that the House could pass a "clean" continuing resolution (CR) before the deadline.
Still, despite all the gloom, there are flickers of hope as some Republicans are calling for a "clean" CR for now to avert the shutdown.
Centrist Reps. Charlie Dent (R-Pa.) and Peter King (R-N.Y.) urged leadership to pass a funding bill without the healthcare riders.
"The hourglass is nearly empty, and it’s time that we pass a clean CR," Dent said.
...
Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) and other members of his conference floated several proposals on Monday to avoid a government shutdown, including a one-week stopgap spending measure.
Based on what happens next, Senate leaders would need unanimous consent to approve any bill sent from the House before midnight.
Tick, tock, tick.
More here. [5]