Congress convenes rare Saturday session with no solution in sight to end shutdown

 

 

WASHINGTON — Lawmakers trickled back into the Capitol for a rare Saturday session with no clear path to resolving the bitter spending-and-immigration impasse that led to a partial government shutdown at midnight Friday.

In the House, Democrats and Republicans huddled in separate camps — emerging only to point fingers at the other party for a stalemate that has shuttered federal agencies and jeopardized government services across the country.

In the Senate, there was one offer on the table that could lead to a breakthrough — a three-week spending bill with a promise to use that time to hash out an immigration deal and other contentious issues — but it was not clear whether Congress could pass such a bill.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., has signaled he was open to that proposal to fund the government through Feb. 8, and a key player in the broader negotiations, Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said he thinks it could work.

“After extensive discussions with senators on both sides of the aisle, I believe such a proposal would pass,” Graham said in a statement Saturday morning. He said it would come with a requirement that if lawmakers don’t reach an agreement on immigration before the Feb. 8 deadline, McConnell would allow a free-flowing debate on the Senate floor to resolve the fate of the so-called “Dreamers,” young immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children.

Those immigrants now have legal protections under an Obama-era program known as DACA. But President Trump announced in September he would kill the DACA program and nix the legal protections for more than 700,000 DACA recipients as of March 5.

“I’m confident we can find a solution to Border Security/DACA once we start the process,” Graham said. “Success on this will lead to a breakthrough on all other issues.”

But House Republicans and White House officials flatly rejected any proposal that would tie their hands on immigration. They said they would not negotiate with the Democrats on DACA until they reopen the government.

“The administration’s position is that as soon as they reopen the government, we’ll resume conversations on DACA,” Marc Short, Trump’s congressional liaison, told reporters after meeting with House Republicans Saturday morning. “It’s hard to negotiate on that when they’re keeping our border agents not paid, keeping our troops unpaid, not paying for American services.”

Short said Trump spoke with McConnell Saturday morning and would be in contact with other congressional leaders throughout the day. But he said the president did not have any meetings scheduled to mediate the standoff.

The shutdown began at 12:01 a.m. on Saturday, after the Senate blocked a short-term spending bill Friday night. Government agencies began ramping down operations Saturday, the one-year anniversary of President Trump’s inauguration.

More: The government shuts down after Senate blocks short-term spending bill

 

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