With no negotiations or compromise in sight, the countdown to the first shutdown of the federal government in 17 years has begun.
Just hours after the Senate defeated a House bill that would have delayed Obamacare for a year as a condition for keeping the government running, Republican leaders came back with yet another proposal that Senate Democrats have promised to reject.
House Speaker John Boehner announced Monday afternoon two new provisions the GOP wants attached to the stopgap funding bill — a one-year delay to the individual mandate to purchase health insurance and a measure that denies members of Congress health care benefits worth more than coverage available to the most basic plans available under the new law.
The new demands, the GOP’s third attempt in the past week to slip Obamacare-related amendments into the continuing resolution, appeared likely to fail as swiftly as the party’s prior attempt did.
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Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has vowed that the upper chamber will reject any resolution to keep the government funded that includes changes to the President’s signature health care law.
“We’re not going to negotiate on this. We have done everything we can to be fair and reasonable,” Reid said Monday, moments after the Senate voted on straight party lines to remove the House-passed amendments delaying Obamacare and repealing a medical device tax from a bill extending government funding.
That vote, shortly after 2 p.m., sent the “clean” bill, along with the onus for averting a shutdown, back to House Republicans, who have repeatedly said they won’t pass a bill that doesn’t, in some way, hamper the Affordable Care Act.
Asked Monday if a stand-alone spending bill would be possible, Boehner replied, “That’s not going to happen.”
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Democrats, meanwhile, seemed resigned Monday evening to an inevitable shutdown.
“We’re at the brink,” Maryland Democratic Sen. Barbara Mikulski said.
President Barack Obama issued his own reprimand toward House Republicans and urged them to take action before midnight.
“Of all the responsibilities the constitution endows to Congress, two should be fairly simple,” Obama said. “Pass a budget and pay America’s bills.”
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In a rare incident of accord with Obama, even some Republicans began criticizing their party's leadership, as a shutdown became more likely throughout the day,
"I disagree with the strategy of linking Obamacare with the continuing functioning of government — a strategy that cannot possibly work," Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said.
Americans, for the most part, appeared to agree.
A CNN poll released Monday morning showed that 46% of U.S. residents would blame Republicans for a federal government shutdown, whereas only 36% would blame Obama.
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Another 13% said they would blame both Republicans and Obama, the poll showed.
If lawmakers do fail to achieve a resolution by midnight, large sections of the government would close, hundreds of thousands of workers would be furloughed without pay, and millions more would be asked to work for no pay, which would create new risks for the fragile economy. But implementation of key parts of the Affordable Care Act will still begin Tuesday as scheduled even if a shutdown were to occur.
The economic uncertainty, nevertheless, rattled U.S. markets throughout the day, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average ultimately closed down 128 points, or 0.8%.
With News Wire Services
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