U.S. Politics
Around-the-clock political news and analysis from Reuters. Follow @ReutersPolitics for more.
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Good Monday to you, readers. It's a day of deadlines, so let's get right to it, shall we?
At 1pm ET we'll be covering the daily White House briefing, which will likely be dominated by the government shutdown that will begin at midnight ET absent agreement in Congress on a funding bill.
We'll also have video at 2pm ET of the Senate's reconvening after a weekend off. You might recall that on Friday Harry Reid and the Senate's Democratic majority pushed through a "clean" bill to fund the government until November 15th, meaning that it stripped out the House's prior inclusion of a provision defunding Obamacare. Reid made clear that weakening Obamacare would always be a Senate nonstarter and government shutdowner.
Well, over the weekend the House volleyed the funding bill back to the Senate with measures that delay Obamacare for a year and repeal a medical device tax that helps fund the law. House members also railed against Reid and the Senate for their opposition to such changes and decision to not follow the House with an emergency weekend session, saying that it was a delay tactic meant to raise the negotiating stakes. For a good sense of the rhetorical state of play, watch this New York Times video of a presser in front of Congress:
All reports suggest that Reid will ensure the Senate rejects the Republican changes, save for the military pay protection passed in seeming anticipation of a shutdown, and sends another clean funding bill back for the House to consider with hours before the shutdown deadline.
House Speaker Boehner then faces a limited, vexing set of options, as John Dickerson of Slate outlines:He can allow a vote on the Senate bill that passed (with Democratic votes) on Friday to fund the government until Nov. 15 or permit the shutdown to go forward, as a way to pressure the White House and satisfy his most conservative members.
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But if he permits the Senate funding measure to make it to the floor, he would need Democratic votes to pass it. That would lead to a sharp reaction from those conservatives who have been making his life so exciting lately.
It's a stark choice that will make or break Boehner's hold on his divided caucus and House leadership. Chatter of classic congressional can-kicking in the form of a month-long funding measure or some other half-measure suggests other ways out, and anything can happen as time wanes and the stakes rise. The two weeks until the next crisis over the debt limit may encourage extending the negotiating window.
Of course, Obamacare is more than a fiscal flashpoint -- it is a law affecting millions of Americans that is rolling out tomorrow, shutdown or not (due to funds already committed). Ezra Klein and Evan Soltas of the Washington Post make the point that the shutdown frenzy initiated by Obamacare opponents may actually do the law a service:The Obama administration has been a bit afraid of October 1st.
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But with a government shutdown and a looming debt-ceiling crisis obsessing the media and the country, the media simply has less bandwidth to cover the rollout of the health-care law. That gives the administration, as well as the states, a bit more breathing room to find and fix bugs in the early days without seeing the law declared a failure.
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But all of this speaks to why the Republican Party is so frightened. Until now, Obamacare has been an abstraction. You can repeal an abstraction. Tomorrow, it becomes a reality. And reality is a lot harder to repeal.
Now, if you've made it this far, in some state or other of anxiety and/or befuddlement, you could do worse than watching this NBC News look back at the last government shutdown in 1996 and wondering at cyclical and cynical Washington: -
Pres Obama tells WH pool in the Oval Office that he expects to talk to congressional leaders Monday, Tues and Wednesday per @jeffmason1by Steve Holland via twitter 9/30/2013 4:58:44 PM
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Carney reading all the stuff that would happen in a shutdown. Includes Sandy recovery efforts; West, TX explosion.by Steven Dennis via twitter 9/30/2013 5:47:41 PM
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Checking your email while on shutdown furlough could land you in jail. wapo.st/1bmyJAkby b_fung via twitter 9/30/2013 5:48:08 PM
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Reuters Video: Federal employees say paying their bills, avoiding eviction are key concerns as the deadline to avert a government shutdown nears. Deborah Gembara reports.
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by Reuters Business via twitter edited by Margarita Noriega (Reuters) 9/30/2013 5:58:01 PM
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Senate meets. Senate Chaplain Barry Black says says "as our nation stumbles toward a seemingly inevitable shutdown" during opening prayer.by Chad Pergram via twitter 9/30/2013 6:04:20 PM
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Reid moves to table or kill House changes to CR. Vote underway now. Needs 51 yeas to send it back to House. #fnpoliticsby Chad Pergram via twitter 9/30/2013 6:05:34 PM
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Senate can be really fast when it wants to - less than three minutes for Sen Reid to put to a vote the House changes to the CRby carl hulse via twitter 9/30/2013 6:11:23 PM
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Institutional memory: Just 37 House Republicans (16%) were around for '95 shutdown. By contrast, 48% got here after G.W. Bush left office.by Dave Wasserman via twitter 9/30/2013 6:13:43 PM
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Votes are being cast now for Reid's immediate motion to table or kill the House's weekend amendments delaying Obamacare for a year and repealing a medical advice tax to help fund Obamacare. A 51-vote majority will strip the amendments out and essentially leave the Senate volleying back the same "clean" funding resolution it sent to the House on Friday after a more protracted, faux-filibuster-filled voting process.
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Staff has just been kicked out of House GOP conference meeting -- members onlyby russellberman via twitter 9/30/2013 6:16:32 PM
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Sen Mark Pryor D-AR votes to table, so it looks like no defections for Democrats on the Obama health law itemsby Jamie Dupree via twitter 9/30/2013 6:19:38 PM
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Reuters Richard Cowan and Kim Dixon report: U.S. Senate Democrats on Monday killed a proposal by the Republican-led House of Representatives to delay Obamacare for a year in return for temporary funding of the federal government beyond Monday.
By a partisan vote of 54 to 46, the Democratic-controlled Senate defeated the Obamacare delay and a House amendment repealing a medical device tax that were attached to an emergency spending bill.
The straight-forward funding bill that would run through Nov. 15 is aimed at averting a government shutdown. It now goes back to the House, where its fate is unknown. -
And less than 20 minutes after convening, the Senate votes to table the amendments that House Republicans spent the weekend putting together. With less than 12 hours until the funding deadline, the House must take up the "clean" funding bill again, considering whether to move ahead on funding alone or continue the volleying and virtually ensure a shutdown. Our preview from earlier delves further into Speaker Boehner's unenviable position.
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If President Obama acted unilaterally to raise debt ceiling, it would not be taken seriously by the world's financial markets, White House spokesman Jay Carney said on Monday.
READ: White House says raising debt cap unilaterally would be suspect -
We're still waiting on the House session to begin and our video feed. It seems that closed-door meetings are creating some delay:
The GOP staffers who were kicked out of the GOP members meeting say the earliest this vote could happen after rules/debate is about 8pm.
— Nancy Cordes (@nancycordes) September 30, 2013 -
Harry Reid says the senators should expect to be on call through the night to vote on House proposals.by Chris Moody via twitter 9/30/2013 7:10:36 PM
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For now, above we have a video feed of House Democratic leaders speaking to the press on Capitol Hill.
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Nancy Pelosi: GOP on Obamacare "like hounds baying at the moon."by 1PatriciaMurphy via twitter 9/30/2013 7:16:51 PM
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Reader PlayFair3 raises an excellent topic: what would happen if U.S. government shuts down? Reuters' Deborah Zabarenko wrote this summary about the impact of a possible shutdown on federal employees, national parks, military personnel, federal tax agency employees, as well as the courts, Justice Department, and the Federal Reserve. The Wall Street Journal also summarized the impact on transportation, national security, and more.
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Kind of amazing that clean CR not even talked about in House GOP meeting. "Not at all," according to one lawmaker.by jennifer bendery via twitter 9/30/2013 7:24:23 PM
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READER COMMENT: I just wish they would make a decision, one way or the other. Tired of the back and Forth. If we as subordinate agencies operated the way they do, we'd be FIRED!
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Pelosi ends the presser, imploring her Republican colleagues to live up to the "dignity" of their office and saying that this showdown is "the major leagues" where the ability of the U.S. to govern its people is at stake. We'll keep our placeholder video up for now as we wait for more action from the House side of the Capitol, where closed-door negotiations are reportedly still underway.
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Utah Rep Chris Stewart says House vote expected at 6 or 7 tonight.by Patricia Zengerle via twitter 9/30/2013 7:36:56 PM
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The Sunlight Foundation has taken a unique look what will happen to government websites if the shutdown occurs.
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by Kelly O'Donnell via twitter edited by Margarita Noriega (Reuters) 9/30/2013 7:39:35 PM
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READER COMMENT: How is it our elected officials still get paid, still have healthcare and benefits during a shutdown? They should suffer the consequences of their actions.
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Paul Ryan just told me there is no possibility of a clean CR coming out of the House by the shutdown deadline.by Chris Moody via twitter 9/30/2013 7:43:38 PM
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New story from Reuters Amanda Becker and Ian Simpson: If Congress fails to approve a spending bill before Tuesday, between 800,000 and 1 million government workers will be forced to take unpaid time off. Only "essential" personnel at parks, federal courthouses, food stamp programs, passport offices and other agencies funded by Congress would keep working until the government is authorized to spend money again.
Nearly 2.8 million people were employed by the federal government as of September 2012, according to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. Not all, however, are at agencies that would be affected by a shutdown.
READ: A million U.S. government workers, unions brace for shutdown -
Speaker John Boehner says that a "clean" government funding measure is "not going to happen", adding that he will amend the Senate budget measure to include a one-year delay for the individual mandate clause in Obamacare as well as changes to healthcare for government employees and administration appointees (Reuters Wire)
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With that, the bill moves over to the Senate, where leaders there have already said they will strip out the new amendments and same back the same "clean" continuing resolution they did earlier today. Reports suggest the Senate will vote by 9:30pm ET, and barring any surprises the House would be up again around 10pm ET.
Also, a few of you have questioned our inclusion of the Boehner speech video in which he impersonates Obama. More than a simple soundbite, the context of that clip offered a window on the charged nature of this debate, with biting attacks being traded all the way up to the most prominent leaders on each side. Boehner was speaking on the House floor, four hours before a potential shutdown, and just an hour or so removed from the phone call with the president he was referencing, during which there was presumably an opportunity to make progress on resolving this crisis. The clip suggested how much farther, perhaps to a historic degree, there is to go. -
We will keep our video feed going above, though it just has a placeholder slate for now, and will let you know when we pick up again from the Senate floor for the next vote.
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READER QUESTION: Why does the House keep sending the same thing, with perhaps a change in wording, to the Senate when they already know that the Senate is going to send it back?
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READER QUESTION: Also, why do they keep having a Continuing Resolution? Why not just pass a proper budget and stop this stupid ongoing mess?
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Thanks for those questions, Janice. They get to the heart of a lot of this. One minute to write up a response and I'll try to provide (at least a bit) more clarity. In the meantime, just a reminder to all of you that we'll try to incorporate as many questions and comments as we can if you're following along and so inclined.
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Janice, your first question about tonight's back-and-forth really depends on which side you ask. If you ask the House Republicans who are sending the CR (continuing resolution, or spending bill) back to the Senate with small variations of their amendments to weaken Obamacare, they will say that they are responding to their constituents (and Americans more broadly) who want them to take this stand against Obamacare. They see the Senate's rejection of their amendments as a refusal to negotiate and a flouting of public opinion. Some believe that they have leverage as the night goes on, or that forcing some Democrats to defend Obamacare to this degree will be advantageous in future elections.
Senate Democrats counter that House Republicans are grandstanding for political purposes and seeking to exert influence they do not have, given the Senate Democratic majority and the desire of many (perhaps even a majority, as we may discover later tonight) to not risk a government shutdown over a healthcare law that has been on the books for several years. This also speaks to your second question about why we are continually battling over continuing resolutions -- the gap between the sides is so great, they can barely set the boundaries of the debate, let alone find a way to come together and broker a lasting deal.
This extends back to the summer 2011 debt limit standoff through the fiscal cliff crisis and up to now, with each standoff seemingly pushing the sides farther apart and into more entrenched positions. -
Reader Question: Is it very hard for both parties to come to a resolution? I get that Obamacare is good for some and bad for others depending on which state you're from, so why not allow Obamacare to be passed in states that want it and allow an opt-out for those that prefer something else?
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Thanks for the Obamacare-by-state question. Obamacare is a federal law requiring individuals without insurance to purchase it on exchanges. That's what Congress passed and the president signed, so it applies regardless of state to the uninsured (affirmed when the Supreme Court declared the individual mandate constitutional).
However, the implementation of the exchanges varies by state, as the Wall Street Journal explained in a good primer last week, complete with graphics showing how each state is handling the rollout. Each state's main choice was whether they wanted to operate their own exchange or leave it to the federal government to set one up. States also chose whether to expand their Medicaid coverage for the poor under the law's new guidelines. In this sense, there is less of a federally-mandated structure for the law's rollout, though there will always need to be significant federal control of legislation this sweeping, which is also intended to reduce health costs by bringing larger numbers into the ranks of the insured. -
Thanks for your answer, Colin. It just seems so stupid that nobody is willing to work together. If the Tea Party supported Republicans think they are speaking for all Republicans, I have news for them because they aren't. All they are doing is driving moderates and independents away from the Republican party. The far left Democrats are no better. I wish we could get rid of the extremists on both side and get back to working together for the good of the American people.
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The Senate just rejected the House's latest funding bill amendments, sending it back to the House as a "clean" continuing resolution once again. They moved even faster than we expected, turning it around before 9:30pm ET.
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forloriann,The U.S. administration on Tuesday encouraged potential enrollees in Obamacare health coverage to seek in-person assistance from a call center and other sources after technical glitches emerged at the debut of the law's new online healthcare marketplaces.A federally run marketplace for consumers in 36 states began posting error messages soon after the system opened for enrollment at 8 a.m. EDT , citing online traffic as a reason for the difficulties. An administration official said experts were aware of the issue and were working to address it. Read more
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@forloriann: The healthcare exchanges were schedule to open today, but there have been many early reports of technical glitches and other problems, such as in Politico here:
In state after state, users weren’t able to sign up for new health exchanges on the Web, encountering messages like “error establishing a database connection,” “your account couldn’t be created at this time,” and “please wait here until we send you the login page.”
We'd love to hear any readers' stories about their experiences using the exchanges, feel free to leave them in the comments. -
Obama tells U.S. government employees shutdown is unfair, political climate too often “has treated you like a punching bag”
Putin says Russia will follow up fast after Ukraine call with Biden
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