Trading blame
Democrats reject GOP ‘piecemeal’ plan
WASHINGTON — First slowed, then stalled by political gridlock, the vast machinery of government clanged into partial shutdown mode Tuesday and President Barack Obama warned the longer it goes “the more families will be hurt.”
Republicans said it was his fault, not theirs, and embarked on a strategy — opposed by Democrats — of voting on bills to reopen individual agencies or programs.
Ominously, there were suggestions from leaders in both parties that the shutdown, heading for its second day, could last for weeks and grow to encompass a possible default by the Treasury if Congress fails to raise the nation’s debt ceiling.
The two issues are “now all together,” said Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill.
Speaking at the White House, Obama accused Republicans of causing the first partial closure in 17 years as part of a nonstop “ideological crusade” to wipe out his signature health care law.
House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, gave as good as he got. “The president isn’t telling the whole story,’ he said in an opinion article posted on the USA Today website. “The fact is that Washington Democrats have slammed the door on reopening the government by refusing to engage in bipartisan talks.”
Officials said roughly 800,000 federal workers would be affected by the shutdown after a halfday on the job Tuesday to fill out time cards, create new voice mail messages and similar chores.
Among those workers were some at the Na-
tional Institute of Health’s famed hospital of last resort, where officials said no new patients would be admitted for the duration of the shutdown.
Dr. Francis Collins, agency director, estimated that each week the shutdown lasts will force the facility to turn away about 200 patients, 30 of them children, who want to enroll in studies of experimental treatments.
Late Tuesday, House Republicans sought swift passage of legislation aimed at reopening small slices of the government. The bills covered the De- partment of Veterans Affairs, the Park Service and parts of the Washington, D.C., government funded with local tax revenue.
Democrats generally opposed all three, saying Republicans shouldn’t be permitted to choose which agencies remain open and which stay shut. As a result, all fell well short of the two-thirds majority needed for passage.
Republican aides said the bills could be brought up again Wednesday under rules requiring a mere majority to pass. They said the House might also vote on a measure to reopen the hospital at the NIH, after several Democrats cited the impact on patients.
The talk of joining the current fight — the Republicans are trying to sidetrack the health law by holding up funding for the fiscal year that began at midnight Monday — to a dispute involving the national debt limit suggested the shutdown could go on for some time.
The administration says the ceiling must be raised by midmonth, and Republicans have long vowed to seek cuts in spending at the same time, a condition Obama has rejected.
Some Republicans seemed resigned to an eventual surrender in this latest struggle with Obama.
Rep. Scott Rigell of Virginia said it was time to pass legislation reopening the government without any health law impediments.
“The shutdown is hurting my district — including the military and the hardworking men and women who have been furloughed due to the defense sequester,” he said.
That was far from the majority view among House Republicans, where tea party-aligned lawmakers prevailed on a reluctant leadership to link federal funding legislation to “Obamacare.”
Boehner has declined to say whether he would allow a vote on a clean spending bill to reopen the government, though Democrats and Obama continued to call on him to do so.
“He’s afraid it will pass,” said Durbin.