1 of 4 | The government shutdown does not interfere with a flag football game on the National Mall with the U.S. Capitol in the background on Sunday. The Senate wasn’t expected to hold any votes on government funding Monday due to the bank holiday. Photo by Pat Benic/UPI | License Photo
Little is expected to change Monday as the government enters the 13th day of a shutdown with lawmakers on a break in observance of a bank holiday.
That didn’t stop some of them from repeating criticisms of their political opponents, each accusing the other of holding Americans hostage to get what they want in a continuing resolution to fund the federal government.
House Speaker Mike Johnson held a news conference at the Capitol on Monday morning, saying Democrats were playing “costly political games.”
“This marks the third week that Democrats have blocked paychecks to our troops, they’ve blocked pay for 2.2 million federal workers, and they’ve held critical services that the American people rely upon in limbo,” he said.
“Democrats today have no leader, no vision, no direction,” Johnson added.
President Donald Trump took to Truth Social over the weekend to announce he ordered Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth to “use all available funds to get our Troops PAID on October 15th.”
“We have identified funds to do this, and Secretary Hegseth will use them to PAY OUR TROOPS,” Trump wrote.
The House in September passed legislation to fund the government through Nov. 21, but the Senate has been unable to bring 60 lawmakers — a supermajority — together to agree on a bill. The upper chamber has voted several times on Democratic and Republican plans and is expected to vote for the eighth time Tuesday when lawmakers return to work, according to Senate Republican leader John Thune.
“Let’s hope there are 5 more Democrats who will join us, because despite all of the good work we’ve done, there’s a lot more we could do if the Schumer Shutdown ends,” the South Dakota lawmaker said in an X post.
At issue are subsidies for Affordable Care Act premiums set to expire in the new year.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer, of New York, reiterated that Senate Democrats wouldn’t support the stopgap legislation unless Republicans back extending the subsidies.
The Trump administration has said it’s against extending the ACA subsidies, falsely claiming undocumented immigrants are taking advantage of it. Undocumented immigrants are not eligible for health insurance under the ACA, the federal healthcare.gov website states.
Democrats, meanwhile, were expected to hold a news conference outside the Capitol on Monday to protest the Trump administration’s decision to lay off thousands of federal workers amid the shutdown, USA Today reported.
House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York also called a caucus meeting for Monday evening “to discuss the path forward.”
The American Bankers Association also provided a list of banks offering assistance to customers financially impacted by the government shutdown.
