President Donald Trump is poised to meet with four congressional leaders Monday afternoon as Congress barrels toward an Oct. 1 deadline to avert a government shutdown — a meeting that one White House official described as a make-or-break moment.
“I think it all hinges on [Monday’s] meeting,” the Trump official told Politico in a report published Monday, speaking with the outlet on the condition of anonymity.
Monday’s Oval Office meeting will see Trump convene with House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD), where the five will work to find an offramp for a looming government shutdown.
Party leaders, however, appear locked in to their current positions, with Democrats drawing a line in the sand with their refusal to support even temporary stopgap spending measures without concessions to fund Affordable Care Act subsidies, which are set to expire this year. Republican leadership appears equally committed to not funding those subsidies, with Thune already admitting ahead of the meeting that “fundamentally, nothing has changed,” Politico reported.
Speaking on the impending meeting with Politico, three Trump officials said that the president is working to mitigate political blowback for Republicans should Democrats refuse to budge on their demands. Nevertheless, several GOP lawmakers have voiced concerns that a shutdown could spell disaster in their own districts, many of which rely heavily on federal government support.
Democrats may also have become emboldened by reporting of major fractures within the GOP on the issue of funding ACA subsidies given that many red states have populations heavily reliant on the federal government health care program. Democrats are also approaching the budget fight well aware of the blowback they received for caving back in March, when Schumer ultimately cooperated with Republicans in passing a spending bill, and without gaining any notable concessions.
Heading into today’s meeting, Democrats appear to be preparing for a more drawn-out fight, have signaled an openness to weathering a government shutdown and pinning it on Republicans. Whether GOP leaders are open to concessions remains to be seen.