US Congress remains deadlocked on budget
WASHINGTON—With a possible default on government obligations just days away, Senate Democratic leaders—believing they have a political advantage in the continuing fiscal impasse—refused on Sunday to sign on to any deal that would reopen the government but lock in budget cuts for next year.
The core of the dispute is about spending, and how long a stopgap measure that would reopen the government should last. Democrats want the across-the-board cuts known as sequestration to last only through mid-November, while Republicans want them to last as long as possible.
The Democrats’ demand shows a newfound aggressiveness. Previously, they had favored a so-called clean bill that would reopen the government and lift the debt ceiling without any policy changes attached.
With Republicans on the defensive, it remains unclear whether the Democrats are using a negotiating ploy to raise the likelihood that any final deal will include their priorities as well as the Republicans’.
Democrats on Sunday said Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, and Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader—who spoke only briefly by telephone—were inching forward, and that a breakthrough was possible before the debt default deadline on Thursday.
“They had a good conversation,” Sen. Charles E. Schumer of New York, the No. 3 Democrat, said on Sunday evening. “They are moving closer together, and I’m hopeful the Senate can save the day.”
No counteroffer
Republicans accused Democrats of accepting nothing short of capitulation without offering anything in return.
“The Democrats keep moving the goalposts,” said Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, one of the lead Republican negotiators. “Decisions within the Democratic conference are constantly changing.”
Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona warned on the CBS News program “Face the Nation” that the Democrats “better understand something.”
“What goes around comes around,” McCain said, “and if they try to humiliate Republicans, things change in American politics.”
A rally on the National Mall, led by Sen. Ted Cruz of Republican and former Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, was intended to show that tea party activists—supporters of the House Republicans who forced the shutdown over their opposition to the new healthcare law—were in no mood to give in. Some waved Confederate flags and called for President Barack Obama to be impeached.
The dispute may involve debt ceiling technicalities, but at the core of the fight is amore fundamental question: With polls showing that Republicans are carrying the brunt of the blame for the shutdown, can Democrats demand total surrender, or should they offer concessions to complete the deal?
Capitulation ruled out
“You can’t just demand pure capitulation,” said Republican Rep. Tom Cole of Oklahoma. “Negotiations don’twork that way.”
Republicans once said that they would finance the government only if the president’s healthcare law was gutted. A bipartisan Senate framework drafted by Collins and Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin III of West Virginia started with a face-saving move for Republicans of a repeal of a tax on medical devices that helps pay for the Affordable Care Act.
When Senate Democratic leaders objected, that was tempered to a two-year delay of the tax.
Republicans had also insisted on tightening income verification rules for the healthcare law’s subsidized insurance exchanges. Now Democrats are rewriting that language as well.
“What am I getting?” Collins said. “I’m serious. I’ve bent over backward.”
Democrats have agreed to engage in formal budget negotiations—where, they acknowledge, Republicans may have the upper hand once the government is reopened and the threat of default is lifted. Both sides say they want a deal that reduces the deficit over the long term.
Deeper cuts loom
Republicans have one advantage: If no deal is reached during those talks, the next round of automatic cuts, even deeper than the first, go into force on Jan. 1.
“We know that come 10 years from now, Medicare is not sustainable financially,” Sen. Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking Democrat, said on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.” “We’ve got to do something.”
“And I have to say to the Republican side, ‘For goodness sakes, we cannot find some savings, closing some loopholes, quote, raising revenue?’ Well, of course we can,” he said.
The Collins plan would maintain sequestration-level spending through Jan. 15, when formal budget negotiators would be required to complete a House-Senate agreement on spending and taxation over the next decade. That date was already a concession.
Collins, along with Senators Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, both Republicans, initially wanted to finance the government for six months at those levels.