House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has thrown down the gauntlet by halting House activities for a critical week, sending a clear message to Senate Democrats as the government shutdown drags on.
Fox News reported that with the 2025 government shutdown entering its second week, Johnson’s decision to keep lawmakers in their districts until at least mid-October underscores a bitter standoff with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., over funding plans.
This saga began when the House, last in full session on September 19, was set to resume regular business early in October, only to have those plans derailed by Johnson’s strategic pause.
On September 29, Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., met with President Donald Trump and GOP leaders to hash out the funding crisis, but no breakthrough emerged.
Instead, Senate Democrats have repeatedly shot down the GOP’s continuing resolution for fiscal year 2025, a plan offering flat funding levels and including $88 million for security across branches—a measure with bipartisan backing.
Democrats, feeling sidelined in these talks, are pushing their own counter-proposal to fund the government through the end of October, laced with demands like reviving enhanced Obamacare subsidies and restoring cuts to Medicaid, NPR, and PBS.
Republicans, unsurprisingly, have called this Democratic plan a non-starter, stuffed with partisan priorities that stray far from a clean funding fix.
They point out that Democrats backed similar straightforward funding measures multiple times under the previous administration, making the current resistance seem more like political theater than principle.
Johnson’s move to cancel House votes also delays unrelated business, like a potential push by Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., to force the release of additional Jeffrey Epstein files from the Department of Justice.
With just one signature needed to bring the Epstein issue to a vote, the delay frustrates bipartisan efforts, though House GOP leaders have dismissed the petition as redundant given ongoing Oversight Committee probes.
Meanwhile, Schumer isn’t holding back, accusing the GOP of misplaced priorities. “Johnson and the House Republicans care more about protecting the Epstein files than protecting the American people,” he declared.
That jab might sting, but let’s be real—linking a procedural delay to neglect of the public feels like a stretch, especially when Democrats’ own funding demands seem more about scoring points than solving problems.
Jeffries, for his part, plans to rally his Democratic caucus back to Washington during the canceled week, a symbolic move that’s more about optics than outcomes without GOP presence.
Sources close to House GOP leadership revealed that canceling activities was one of several tactics on the table, depending on the Senate’s latest vote, though Democrats’ refusal to budge left little room for compromise.