The partial government shutdown that began on Saturday will continue until at least Tuesday — and possibly longer, depending on whether President Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson can round up the necessary votes to pass a $1.2 trillion funding package modified by the Senate.
Trump pressures lawmakers: Trump made clear Monday afternoon that he wants House lawmakers to pass the bill.
“I am working hard with Speaker Johnson to get the current funding deal, which passed in the Senate last week, through the House and to my desk, where I will sign it into Law, IMMEDIATELY!” he wrote inn a social media post. “We need to get the Government open, and I hope all Republicans and Democrats will join me in supporting this Bill, and send it to my desk WITHOUT DELAY. There can be NO CHANGES at this time. We will work together in good faith to address the issues that have been raised, but we cannot have another long, pointless, and destructive Shutdown that will hurt our Country so badly — One that will not benefit Republicans or Democrats. I hope everyone will vote, YES!”
Trump and Johnson will need GOP unity because the speaker is looking to pass the package, including five full-year funding bills and a two-week extension for the Department of Homeland Security, without having to rely on massive Democratic support. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries made clear to Johnson on Saturday that his members won’t be lining up to back the deal cut by Senate Democrats and the White House. House Democrats are hesitant to help pass the package because it includes money for DHS but does not require major reforms to the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics. The two-week funding extension is meant to buy time for further negotiations on Democratic demands.
Democratic and Republican divisions: Some House Democrats have said that they support the package, but Democratic opposition was sizable enough that it precluded Johnson from trying to pass the bill under a suspension of the rules, a process that requires a two-third majority.
Instead, Johnson will try to muscle the package through the normal process with help from President Trump, despite intense opposition from a group of conservative Republicans, some of whom are demanding changes of their own to the funding package. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna of Florida is leading a bloc of hardliners demanding that Johnson attach the SAVE Act, which requires proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections, to the legislation.
“We all want the SAVE Act. We also look at the reality of the numbers here,” Johnson reportedly said Monday afternoon. “But this is a funding package right now, and I don’t think we need to be playing games with government funding. We still have winter storms. We’ve FEMA and TSA and troop pay and everything else wrapped into this. So we need to get the job done.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer indicated that a bill that includes the SAVE Act wouldn’t get through the Senate and would only lengthen the shutdown. “The SAVE Act is nothing more than Jim Crow 2.0. It would disenfranchise millions of Americans,” Schumer wrote in a post on X. “Every single Senate Democrat will vote against any bill that contains it. Speaker Johnson should tell SAVE Act Republicans to stand down or else this shutdown will be on them.”
Setting up the vote: The first procedural test began Monday at an afternoon hearing of the House Rules Committee, which will have to pass the rule governing consideration of the bill. If or when the funding package gets to the House floor, Johnson will have little room for GOP defections. Democrat Christian Menefee of Texas, who won a special election to replace the late Rep. Sylvester Turner, is expected to be sworn in to his House seat on Monday night, leaving Republicans with a 218-214 majority. Johnson would not be able to lose more than one Republican on a party-line vote.
The next fight will be even harder: Longer-term funding for DHS will likely prove even more problematic. Johnson on Sunday rejected a Democratic demand that federal immigration agents be barred from wearing masks and required to wear identification. He also indicated he’s opposed to a Democratic call for tighter requirements for judicial warrants for immigration enforcement.
The bottom line: It’s not clear yet whether the funding package to reopen the government will pass on Tuesday, but one senator was confident it’ll get done within days. “I think that by the end of the week, the House and the Senate will have passed 11 of the 12 appropriations bills,” Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana told CNN. “Now, it’ll be a bumpy road for the House. It’ll be a clown circus for a few days, but I think they’ll ultimately pass.”