Government shutdown live updates as Senate prepares to vote again
John McDonnell/AP 
At his now-daily news conference at the Capitol, House Speaker Mike Johnson said he supports returning wages to furloughed federal workers once the shutdown ends.
“My understanding is that the law says they would be paid. There’s another legal analysis that’s been floating around. I’ve still had time to dig into it and read that, but that’s always been the case, it’s tradition and I think it’s statutory law, that federal employees should be paid, and that’s my position. And I think they should be,” the speaker said. “They should not suffer harm or financial hardship because Chuck Schumer wants to play political games.”
He also threw cold water on the idea of bringing the House back to vote on separate legislation to pay members of the military, saying House Democrats had an opportunity to support the continuing resolution that would have averted the shutdown.
“Hakeem Jeffries and the House Democrats are crying out to come back here and have another vote, because some of them want this on the record and say they are in favor of paying the troops. We’ve already had this vote. It’s called CR,” Johnson said. “Every Republican and at least one Democrat had the good sense to say, ‘Of course we want to keep the government running, of course we want to pay our troops and our air traffic controllers and our Border Patrol agents and the TSA and everyone else.’ We had this vote. »
He continued: “They’re living with this vote. They’ve made this decision. The House is over. The ball is now in the Senate’s court. It doesn’t do us any good to be here procrastinating on sham votes.”
The speaker said Republicans are “not asking Democrats to do anything heroic.”
“We ask them to fulfill their fundamental duty and responsibility,” Johnson said. “I’m sorry, I’m exasperated. The first responsibility of government is to protect the people. And the people who are supposed to be protected are being completely misled by Senate Democrats because they want to play politics.”
