House Democrats and outside groups have been wary of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s ability to “stand up” to Republicans ahead of a potential government shutdown — but party leaders are leaving Washington this week saying they’re “unified” on their funding negotiation demands.
Earlier this year, Schumer voted for a Republican continuing resolution along with nine other Democrats, enraging many in his party. But now, with government funding set to run out on Sept. 30, Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries are putting on a united front, telling reporters Thursday their respective caucuses wouldn’t support a bill that had no concessions on health care.
“The Republicans have to come to meet with us in a true bipartisan negotiation to satisfy the American people’s needs on health care, or they won’t get our votes, plain and simple,” Schumer told reporters Thursday morning at a press conference alongside Jeffries and Democrats from both chambers.
“Good,” Rep. Greg Casar, chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, said in response to Schumer’s comments on Thursday. “Any Senate Democrat who isn’t ready to stand up and fight to protect health care might as well pack up and go home.”
This week, Republican appropriators seemed to coalesce around a short-term continuing resolution, or CR, which would keep funding at its current level and kick the deadline into November. Along with that CR, they want to seal the deal on three full-year appropriations bills that the Senate had already passed — Republicans plan to move next week on that bundle.
But Democrats are still smarting from the Republicans’ tax and spending package in July that made significant cuts to federal health care funding, as well as a rescissions package that clawed back $9 billion in appropriated funds. Democrats — whose votes are needed particularly in the Senate — are vowing to withhold their votes to keep the government open unless Republicans reverse some health care cuts.
“All of us here are in total agreement: what the Republicans are proposing is not good enough for the American people and not good enough to get our votes,” Jeffries said.
Republicans are well aware they need those votes, but how they will get them is still up in the air.
“They’re not going to just simply accept whatever we propose,” Sen. Mike Rounds, a Republican appropriator, said of Democrats on Thursday. “They’re going to have to have a say in it as well. That’s expected, but it’s going to have to be one that the House will eventually recognize as being fair, and that the White House would say is an OK path.”
Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, another Republican appropriator, said Thursday she didn’t understand what specific concessions the Democrats want, but especially with Schumer’s early distaste for the proposal, she said the best way to pass a CR would be to “keep it as clean as possible.”
“These are always times when political points can be scored, and it looks like that’s what they want to do, so I don’t know that we’re going to get to cooperation,” Capito said.
But so far, Democrats say they haven’t seen efforts from Republicans to negotiate health care into the package.
“We have had absolutely no response from Republicans to come together and make this spending plan about reducing the cost of living and protecting people’s health care,” Rep. Katherine Clark, the House Minority Whip, told reporters Thursday.
One form that health care concessions could take is extending the enhanced subsidies for the Affordable Care Act that are set to expire in December. Millions of people will see their health care premiums skyrocket in the new year if those subsidies lapse. Hardline conservatives in the House Freedom Caucus are staunchly against including those extensions in a CR or any must-pass legislation.
“If that’s included in the CR that’s proposed next week, all hell will break loose on the House floor,” Rep. Andy Harris, Freedom Caucus chairman, told reporters Thursday.
There are Republicans who support the ACA subsidy extensions, particularly in the Senate. Appropriations Chair Sen. Susan Collins told Semafor on Wednesday that she supports the extension, but “that doesn’t really have anything to do with the need to keep the government funded.”
Retiring Republican Sen. Thom Tillis told reporters Thursday that he thinks there’s a way to get other Republicans on board with extending the ACA subsidies, namely “improving program integrity” and using the expiration deadline as a pressure point. Republican leaders reportedly maintain that such an extension won’t be attached to the CR they’re polishing.
Some Democrats said they see the ACA subsidy expirations as one of many things that could be remedied in government funding negotiations. Rep. Glenn Ivey, a Democratic appropriator in the House, told NOTUS he wants to see any funding package go further to address an expected rise in energy and health care costs for Americans in the last months of the year.
“There’s a whole range of negative things that the Republicans have put in place or are putting in place, and they all have to be on the table from my perspective,” Ivey said.
Democratic leaders have yet to articulate a specific proposal they’ll need to see in order to keep the government open. When asked Wednesday morning whether an extension of the ACA subsidies must be included in a funding package, Jeffries and Schumer both voiced broad concerns about the “unprecedented Republican assault on the health care of the American people.”
“I’ve been clear all along that we’re not going to provide them a partisan blank check when it comes to the Trump administration’s agenda,” Democratic Sen. Chris Van Hollen, an appropriator, said of Republican funding proposals.
Democrats are already trying to make health care the defining issue of the 2026 midterms, and some polls shared with House Republicans show that the Medicaid cuts in the tax bill are a messaging problem for them.
“Two things drive elections, at least in the time that I’ve been in elected politics,” said Tillis, who voted against the tax bill because of those cuts. “One is a bad economy. The other one is bad decisions on health care.”