WASHINGTON — Democratic leaders attempted to ramp up pressure on President Trump to meet with them after he gave them the cold shoulder on Tuesday and canceled prior plans to discuss their demands to avert a partial government shutdown.
So far, it doesn’t appear to be working.
Trump had abruptly canceled a planned Thursday meeting with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), shortly after discussing the shutdown fight with GOP leadership.
“It’s so easy to just sit down and talk to us, and we know we’re not going to get everything, but he’s not even doing that,” Schumer complained on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” Wednesday.
“And the American people are going to say, ‘WTF? Why won’t he do that?’ There’s no good reason.”
Democrats have demanded an array of health care-related concessions to give the green light to a stopgap measure that will keep the government’s lights on through Nov. 21.
But Trump and Republicans have insisted Congress stick with a “clean” continuing resolution that has no strings attached.
Both Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) have said that Congress will consider one of the Dems’ key demands — an extension of the Affordable Care Act’s subsidies — after the shutdown fight.
“This is a program that needs reform, but I think everybody is willing to sit down and talk about how to make that happen in a context where it should be discussed, not as a hostage, to keep the government open,” Thune told CNN’s “Inside Politics” on Wednesday.
Currently, a bipartisan group of lawmakers is deliberating over a potential way to extend the subsidies.
If Congress fails to act, the government will enter a partial shutdown after 11:59 p.m. Tuesday.
The “clean” GOP bill to forestall a partial shutdown cleared the House last week but failed in the Senate. A separate Democrat-backed stopgap also failed in the Senate.
That measure featured an extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies, which are set to expire at the end of the year, a reversal of the Republicans’ Medicaid reform in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (now Working Families Tax Cut Act), and quashed some of Trump’s funding freezes.
Both chambers are out on recess this week, and Johnson has indicated he plans to keep the House out of session until after the deadline to fund the government passes, a tactic intended to force the hand of Senate Dems.
Seeking to minimize the blame Democrats might incur if the government’s lights go off, Jeffries gathered reporters and fumed about the process.
“Republicans have clearly demonstrated they want to shut the government down,” Jeffries chided. “They’re not even pretending as if they want to find common ground.
“Donald Trump agrees to our demand on Saturday to hold a meeting in the Oval Office to try to avert a government shutdown. The meeting is set on Monday for later on in the week. And then Donald Trump wakes up Tuesday morning and goes on an unhinged rant and cancels the meeting,” he added.
“Why? Because he doesn’t want to discuss the Republican health care crisis.”
Jeffries also noted that he hasn’t spoken with Johnson about the looming shutdown threat since last week.
Trump reposted his Truth Social message, canceling the previously planned meeting with Jeffries and Schumer because of their “unserious and ridiculous demands.”
The president noted that he’ll “be happy to meet with them” if they “become realistic.”
Schumer and Jeffries have come under intense pressure from their progressive base to leverage the government shutdown fight to extract concessions from Republicans. Schumer faced the wrath of lefty activists in March when he declined to block a GOP-backed bill to keep the government funded.
Still, the Senate Minority Leader technically hasn’t publicly ruled out the possibility of caving.
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