By Michael O'Brien, Political Reporter, NBC News
The Senate met Tuesday to quickly reject the latest attempt by House Republicans for force formal negotiations over funding the government as a shutdown that shuttered the government at midnight dragged into its first business day.
The Senate voted along party lines to dispense with the latest stopgap spending measure volleyed to them by the House, essentially returning the debate to the lower chamber, and suggesting that the larger battle over reinstating funding is nowhere near resolution.
And as the stalemate played out, President Barack Obama said set to deliver a statement from the Rose Garden at 12:25 p.m., where he was expected to both address the shutdown and the opening of enrollment for health insurance exchanges under his signature health care law.
The federal government shut down at midnight after lawmakers failed to reach an agreement to finance government operations past Sept. 30. The shutdown places President Barack Obama, his Democratic allies and Republican adversaries in Congress onto uncertain political terrain.
Brendan Smialowski / AFP - Getty Images
Members of the US Park Service close the Lincoln memorial on the National Mall October 1, 2013 in Washington, DC.The United States lurched into a dreaded government shutdown today for the first time in 17 years, after Congress failed to end a bitter budget row after hours of dizzying brinkmanship. AFP PHOTO / Brendan SMIALOWSKIBRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images
Monday’s flurry of activity ended after Democrats rejected an 11th-hour attempt by Republicans to convene a “conference” committee – the formal process of resolving differences between House and Senate legislation – after their repeated attempts to both fund government and undo either part or all of Obamacare were rejected by the Democratic Senate.
“We will not go to conference with a gun to our head,” Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said late Monday on the Senate floor.
NBC's Chuck Todd explains why some Republicans are not happy with House Speaker John Boehner's strategy which led to the government shutdown. Joe Scarborough explains how the shutdown hurts the Republican brand and why members of the Senate Republican committee are really concerned about the impact of the shutdown on upcoming elections. Meet the Press moderator David Gregory also joins the conversation asking what have Republicans extracted from their move to shut down the government.
In a message to members of the military and civilian employees of the Department of Defense – who are among the hundreds of thousands of federal workers facing a furlough on Tuesday – President Barack Obama said they “deserve better than the dysfunction we’re seeing in Congress,” and vowed to work to reopen the government.
As the shutdown played out, the president was set to meet with Vice President Joe Biden at the White House. This afternoon, Obama was set to meet with beneficiaries of new health insurance exchanges that were made available today under the Affordable Care Act – the law which House Republicans have repeatedly sought to undo as a condition of funding government.
But it was up to lawmakers to break their stalemate over funding the government, and the path toward an agreement to re-open the federal government was anything but clear on Tuesday morning.
With little hope of a quick solution, leaders of both parties shifted to playing the blame game, as Republicans accused Democrats of having forced the shut down, and vice versa.
Families across the nation are already feeling the effects of the government shutdown, from the cessation of processing passports to closed national parks. NBC's Peter Alexander reports.
"The House has made its position clear: keep the government running and ensure basic fairness for all Americans under ObamaCare,” House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said in a statement early Tuesday morning. "Unfortunately, Senate Democrats chose to shut down the government rather than discuss or even recognize ObamaCare’s failures."
But new polling released Tuesday morning suggested that blame was likely to fall unevenly upon both political parties, with Americans directing their ire more toward Republicans in Congress than Obama or Democratic lawmakers.
A Quinnipiac University poll found that Americans gave Republicans in Congress their lowest marks ever, with 74 percent disapproving of the way the GOP is handling its job. (Sixty percent of Americans said they disapproved of the way Democrats in Congress were handling their job, and 49 percent disapproved of the way Obama is handling his job.)
Moreover, the poll also found that voters broadly oppose – 72 to 22 percent – shutting down the federal government to block the implementation of Obamacare, the core element of Republicans’ strategy to date. And perhaps more ominously for the GOP, the Quinnipiac poll also found that Democrats enjoyed their strongest showing over Republicans in the generic congressional ballot, a key barometer of national sentiment heading into the midterm elections, since 2009.
If elections for the House were being held today, the poll found, 43 percent of voters would prefer to elect a Democratic candidate, versus 43 percent who would elect a Republican.
This story was originally published on Tue Oct 1, 2013 9:56 AM EDT
The Senate met Tuesday to quickly reject the latest attempt by House Republicans for force formal negotiations over funding the government as a shutdown that shuttered the government at midnight dragged into its first business day.
The Senate voted along party lines to dispense with the latest stopgap spending measure volleyed to them by the House, essentially returning the debate to the lower chamber, and suggesting that the larger battle over reinstating funding is nowhere near resolution.
And as the stalemate played out, President Barack Obama said set to deliver a statement from the Rose Garden at 12:25 p.m., where he was expected to both address the shutdown and the opening of enrollment for health insurance exchanges under his signature health care law.
The federal government shut down at midnight after lawmakers failed to reach an agreement to finance government operations past Sept. 30. The shutdown places President Barack Obama, his Democratic allies and Republican adversaries in Congress onto uncertain political terrain.
Members of the US Park Service close the Lincoln memorial on the National Mall October 1, 2013 in Washington, DC.The United States lurched into a dreaded government shutdown today for the first time in 17 years, after Congress failed to end a bitter budget row after hours of dizzying brinkmanship. AFP PHOTO / Brendan SMIALOWSKIBRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP/Getty Images
Monday’s flurry of activity ended after Democrats rejected an 11th-hour attempt by Republicans to convene a “conference” committee – the formal process of resolving differences between House and Senate legislation – after their repeated attempts to both fund government and undo either part or all of Obamacare were rejected by the Democratic Senate.
“We will not go to conference with a gun to our head,” Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said late Monday on the Senate floor.
NBC's Chuck Todd explains why some Republicans are not happy with House Speaker John Boehner's strategy which led to the government shutdown. Joe Scarborough explains how the shutdown hurts the Republican brand and why members of the Senate Republican committee are really concerned about the impact of the shutdown on upcoming elections. Meet the Press moderator David Gregory also joins the conversation asking what have Republicans extracted from their move to shut down the government.
In a message to members of the military and civilian employees of the Department of Defense – who are among the hundreds of thousands of federal workers facing a furlough on Tuesday – President Barack Obama said they “deserve better than the dysfunction we’re seeing in Congress,” and vowed to work to reopen the government.
As the shutdown played out, the president was set to meet with Vice President Joe Biden at the White House. This afternoon, Obama was set to meet with beneficiaries of new health insurance exchanges that were made available today under the Affordable Care Act – the law which House Republicans have repeatedly sought to undo as a condition of funding government.
But it was up to lawmakers to break their stalemate over funding the government, and the path toward an agreement to re-open the federal government was anything but clear on Tuesday morning.
With little hope of a quick solution, leaders of both parties shifted to playing the blame game, as Republicans accused Democrats of having forced the shut down, and vice versa.
Families across the nation are already feeling the effects of the government shutdown, from the cessation of processing passports to closed national parks. NBC's Peter Alexander reports.
"The House has made its position clear: keep the government running and ensure basic fairness for all Americans under ObamaCare,” House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said in a statement early Tuesday morning. "Unfortunately, Senate Democrats chose to shut down the government rather than discuss or even recognize ObamaCare’s failures."
But new polling released Tuesday morning suggested that blame was likely to fall unevenly upon both political parties, with Americans directing their ire more toward Republicans in Congress than Obama or Democratic lawmakers.
A Quinnipiac University poll found that Americans gave Republicans in Congress their lowest marks ever, with 74 percent disapproving of the way the GOP is handling its job. (Sixty percent of Americans said they disapproved of the way Democrats in Congress were handling their job, and 49 percent disapproved of the way Obama is handling his job.)
Moreover, the poll also found that voters broadly oppose – 72 to 22 percent – shutting down the federal government to block the implementation of Obamacare, the core element of Republicans’ strategy to date. And perhaps more ominously for the GOP, the Quinnipiac poll also found that Democrats enjoyed their strongest showing over Republicans in the generic congressional ballot, a key barometer of national sentiment heading into the midterm elections, since 2009.
If elections for the House were being held today, the poll found, 43 percent of voters would prefer to elect a Democratic candidate, versus 43 percent who would elect a Republican.
This story was originally published on Tue Oct 1, 2013 9:56 AM EDT