Democratic and Republican congressional leaders emerged from a meeting with President Donald Trump no closer to a deal to avert a government shutdown, with the funding deadline looming in just over 24 hours.
House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) met with Trump at the White House on Monday, and the parties are still at a standstill over a short-term spending deal to keep the government open long enough for appropriators to pass the remaining funding bills for fiscal 2026.
Leaving the meeting, both parties continued blaming the other, with Democrats insisting that the ball is in Republicans’ court. Schumer told reporters that he and Jeffries proposed several ideas to the gathered group, but noted that Trump is “ultimately the decision-maker.”
“If he will accept some of the things we ask, which we think the American people are for, on healthcare and rescissions, he can avoid a shutdown, but there are still large differences between us,” Schumer said.
Jeffries echoed Schumer’s comments, noting that the Democrats are still “deadly serious” about their healthcare requests, and they will not vote for a “partisan” spending bill — remarks he has made over the last week, showing the needle has not moved much despite the White House meeting.
But GOP leaders are pointing fingers at their counterparts, accusing the Democrats of “hijacking” the funding process. Vice President JD Vance, who left the meeting with congressional Republican leadership, said the principle at stake is “very simple.”
“We have disagreements about tax policy, but you don’t shut the government down. … You don’t use your policy disagreements as leverage,” Vance said.
With leaders no closer to a continuing resolution, the government funding deadline of 11:59 p.m. Tuesday is becoming more likely to arrive and pass without a deal. As of Monday evening, the Senate does not have the 60 votes required to break the filibuster on the “clean” CR passed by the House on Sept. 19.
“I think we’re headed for a shutdown,” the vice president said. “Because the Democrats won’t do the right thing.”
Democrats have insisted they want concrete, “ironclad” agreements that will address the “consequences” of the healthcare reforms in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which Schumer and Jeffries said they spelled out for Trump.
“And by his face, and by the way he looked, I think he heard about them for the first time,” Schumer said, adding that Johnson and Thune failed to negotiate with him or Jeffries.
“They never talked to us,” the Senate Democratic leader added.
Vance rebuffed Schumer’s characterization of Trump’s reaction to the healthcare demands.
“I’m highly skeptical that the president was learning about it for the first time, thanks to Chuck Schumer,” Vance said.
JEFFRIES DIGS IN ON OBAMACARE TAX CREDIT DEMANDS, SAYS VOTE CAN’T WAIT UNTIL AFTER SHUTDOWN
Vance added that though he and Trump disagreed with many of the Democrats’ demands, there were some “that I actually thought were reasonable, and the president thought were reasonable.”
“There were multiple times where Leader Jeffries or Leader Schumer would say, ‘You know what, we should be doing this,’ and the president of the United States would say, ‘Yeah, absolutely, let’s have that conversation,’ but we’re going to do it in the context of the people’s government being open,” Vance said. “We’re not going to let you take the people’s government hostage, and then give you everything you want.”
