President-elect Donald Trump is opening the door to a government shutdown a week before Christmas. Republican lawmakers don’t appear to be on board.
Facing a Friday night funding deadline, Republican leaders were already struggling to build support for passage of a bipartisan catch-all bill to punt the funding fight into March. Now Trump and incoming Vice President JD Vance are publicly excoriating the deal, calling on Speaker Mike Johnson and other Republicans to pass a funding bill without any Democratic priorities — even if it means a shutdown. They also want the debt ceiling raised along with that legislation, a complicated issue lawmakers hadn’t planned to deal with for months.
As GOP members streamed into Johnson’s office to pick up gifts and stop by an ironically timed Christmas party, they didn’t voice enthusiasm for Trump’s demands. Recent debt limit negotiations have taken months and take up a lot of oxygen on Capitol Hill. Clearing it in days is a tall order, especially with lawmakers eager to leave town for the holidays.
Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Ala.) answered “no” to questions about both if he’s interested in launching debt limit talks at this point and if he thinks linking debt limit to spending is possible before the deadline.
“You’d love to have [a comprehensive spending deal] with the debt ceiling and then be done with it,” said Rep. Kevin Hern (R-Okla.). “That's not going to happen. There aren't votes for that. But, you know, if you have a CR with the debt limit, at least, you get part of the problem done.”
Asked if it was realistic to try to add a debt ceiling increase to the spending bill, Hern responded: “Every time you change something, it’s a challenge.”
Trump upped the ante by threatening primary challenges against Republican lawmakers who back a stopgap spending bill that does not also raise the debt limit and warning them to force a vote on "the mess of the Debt Limit" during his administration.
"Any Republican that would be so stupid as to do this should, and will, be Primaried," he posted on Truth Social. "Everything should be done, and fully negotiated, prior to my taking office on January 20th, 2025."
Trump's insistence on the inclusion of the debt limit upended the discussion between Republicans on the spending bill.
“When I woke up this morning that was not on my mind, okay? But it’s on my mind tonight because Mr. Trump has indicated that’s important for him," said Rep. Steve Womack (R-ARk.) "Whether or not that’s doable or not, ultimately … that’s a whip team operation to figure out.”
He warned that there's "always a possibility” of a shutdown.
Republicans are likely to need Democratic support to move any type of spending patch at this point. While GOP leaders were considering trying to pass a “clean” stopgap that left off the unrelated additions like disaster aid, they’re nervous that pulling those would mean they lose even more support on both sides of the aisle.
“If Congressional leaders intend to leave DC before the holidays without passing disaster recovery, they should be prepared to spend Christmas in the Capitol. I'll use every tool available to block a CR that fails Western North Carolina communities in need of long-term certainty,” Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.) said on social media.
If Republicans opt to use a fast-track legislative procedure to bypass committees and get a funding patch to the floor, known as suspension, it would require a two-thirds majority to pass. That means a large number of Democrats would have to vote for it — and many of them had planned to back Johnson’s existing plan that includes the additions.
“Great question,” said Rep. Blake Moore (R-Utah) when asked what incentives Democrats would have to help pass a bill with many of their priorities removed.
Top Democrats signaled they weren’t in any mood to bail Republicans out of their debt-and-spending predicament, which could leave the House majority in the lurch as the Friday government shutdown deadline draws closer. House Democrats were scheduled to meet for a closed-door caucus meeting Thursday morning as they charted their path forward.
“House Republicans have now unilaterally decided to break a bipartisan agreement that they made,” said House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries. “House Republicans have been ordered to shut down the government and hurt everyday Americans all across this country. House Republicans will now own any harm that is visited upon the American people that results from a government shutdown, or worse.”
Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer said he was waiting to see what the House does.
"We have a deal with Republicans and we’re sticking with it," Schumer told Democrats gathered on the House floor Wednesday night, according to a person familiar with the conversation.
As the U.S. sits at more than $36 trillion in national debt, the cap on the nation’s borrowing power will be reinstated on Jan. 1. Then starts months of Treasury Department guessing as to when the country would actually default on its loans despite the typical “extraordinary measures” the government deploys to prevent a default.
Bipartisan negotiations to waive or raise the limit typically take months, as was the case during Trump’s first administration, when he empowered then-Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin to strike a deal with then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi in 2017. That kind of debt deal is usually tied to an agreement on funding caps.
Ursula Perano and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.
