House Democrats on Wednesday will begin stepping up pressure on Republican lawmakers to vote for legislation that would reopen some of the nine agencies and departments that have been shut down due to the fight over border wall funding.
The first vote is set for Wednesday, when Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., brings up a bipartisan bill to fund the Treasury Department and the IRS.
The House will vote to fund the Agriculture Department, Interior, and the Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday and will hold votes to fund the departments of Housing and Urban Development and Transportation on Friday.
Additional spending legislation is planned for next week to open the remaining agencies, including the Homeland Security Department, where President Trump had hoped to add up to $5.7 billion in wall funding. Funding lapsed at midnight on Dec. 22, and the partial government shutdown is now in its third week.
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., outlined the plan Tuesday, hours before Trump and Democrats planned dueling prime-time addresses about the president’s desire for a federally funded southern border wall.
Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., will deliver the rebuttal to Trump’s 9 p.m. Oval Office address. The two Democrats are refusing to discuss border security until Trump agrees to sign spending legislation to reopen the impacted departments and agencies.
“Dems are willing to negotiate border security, but there’s no reason to hold government hostage while those discussions continue,” Hoyer tweeted Tuesday afternoon. “The Administration continues to push for walls or fencing — experts agree neither are effective solutions to secure our borders.”
Republicans voted in unison late last year to fund the spending measures with the addition of the $5.7 billion in wall funding. But Democrats blocked the measure in the Senate.
Now, Democrats control the House and are using their new authority to bring up spending bills stripped of wall funding. The move will make it difficult for Republicans to remain steadfast in their support of Trump’s decision to fight for wall funding.
More than 800,000 federal employees are not getting paid, and government services provided by the nine agencies have been increasingly hobbled.
In addition to overflowing trash cans left full by missing Park Service employees, Transportation Security Administration agents have reportedly started to call in sick, causing longer airport security lines, although TSA has said these reports are overblown.
Republicans in the Senate, including Cory Gardner of Colorado and Susan Collins of Maine, have begun calling for votes to reopen the government.
“We could reopen much of government where there’s no dispute over issues involving certain departments like Agriculture, Transportation, Housing, Interior,” Collins told NBC on Sunday. “Let’s get those reopened while the negotiations continue.”
Collins said she also understood why Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has refused to bring up the bills.
“The fact is that unless Chuck Schumer and Speaker Pelosi agree and the president agrees to sign a bill, we can pass bills but they won’t become law,” Collins said. “So that’s why I understand the point that Senator McConnell is making about these important negotiations that are in fact ongoing.”
