Senate Leaders Talk but Fail to Reach Deal on Shutdown
The disagreement extended the stalemate that has kept much of the
government shuttered for two weeks and threatens to force a federal
default.
The core of the dispute is about spending, and how long a stopgap
measure that would reopen the government should last. Democrats want the
across-the-board cuts known as sequestration to last only through
mid-November; Republicans want them to last as long as possible.
Democrats said that Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader,
and Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader — who
spoke only briefly by telephone Sunday — were inching forward, and that a
breakthrough was possible before the debt default deadline on Thursday.
Mr. McConnell did not go to the Capitol on Sunday.
“They had a good conversation,” Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York,
the No. 3 Democrat, said on Sunday evening. “They are moving closer
together, and I’m hopeful the Senate can save the day.”
Republicans accused Democrats of accepting nothing short of capitulation
without offering anything in return. “The Democrats keep moving the
goal posts,” said Senator Susan Collins of Maine, one of the lead
Republican negotiators. “Decisions within the Democratic conference are
constantly changing.”
Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, warned on the CBS News
program “Face the Nation” that the Democrats “better understand
something.”
“What goes around comes around,” he said, “and if they try to humiliate
Republicans, things change in American politics.”
A rally on the National Mall, led by Senator Ted Cruz, Republican of
Texas, and former Gov. Sarah Palin of Alaska, was intended to show that
Tea Party activists — supporters of the House Republicans who forced the
shutdown over their opposition to the new health care law — were in no
mood to give in. Some waved Confederate flags and called for President
Obama to be impeached.
The dispute may involve debt ceiling technicalities, but at the core of
the fight is a more fundamental question: with polls showing that
Republicans are carrying the brunt of the blame for the shutdown, can
Democrats demand total surrender, or should they offer concessions to
complete the deal?
“You can’t just demand pure capitulation,” said Representative Tom Cole,
Republican of Oklahoma. “Negotiations don’t work that way.”
Republicans who once said that they would finance the government only if
the president’s health care law was gutted are in full retreat. A
bipartisan Senate framework drafted by Ms. Collins and Senator Joe
Manchin III, Democrat of West Virginia, started with a face-saving move
for Republicans of a repeal of a tax on medical devices that helps pay
for the Affordable Care Act. When Senate Democratic leaders objected,
that was tempered to a two-year delay of the tax.
Republicans had also insisted on tightening income verification rules
for the health care law’s subsidized insurance exchanges. Now Democrats
are rewriting that language as well.
“What am I getting?” Ms. Collins said. “I’m serious. I’ve bent over backward.”
Democrats have agreed to engage in formal budget negotiations — where,
they acknowledge, Republicans may have the upper hand once the
government is reopened and the threat of default is lifted. Both sides
say they want a deal that reduces the deficit over the long term and
shifts some budget cuts to programs that are essentially on autopilot,
like farm subsidies and Medicare.
Republicans have one advantage: if no deal is reached during those
talks, the next round of automatic cuts, even deeper than the first, go
into force on Jan. 1.
“We know that come 10 years from now, Medicare is not sustainable
financially,” Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the second-ranking
Democrat, said on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.” “We’ve got to
do something. We know that Social Security has 20 years, or perhaps
less.”
“And I have to say to the Republican side, ‘For goodness’s sakes, we
cannot find some savings, closing some loopholes, quote, raising
revenue?’ Well, of course we can,” he said.
The Collins plan would maintain sequestration-level spending through
Jan. 15, when former budget negotiators would be required to complete a
House-Senate agreement on spending and taxation over the next decade.
That date was already a concession. Ms. Collins, along with Senators
Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, both
Republicans, initially wanted to finance the government for six months
at those levels. The initial proposal by Ms. Collins would also have
extended the debt ceiling only to Nov. 15, but at the request of Senate
Democratic leaders, she and Mr. McConnell pushed it back to Jan. 31.
Mr. McConnell formally endorsed the Collins proposal on Sunday.
“It would reopen the government, prevent a default, provide the
opportunity for additional budget negotiations around Washington’s
long-term debt, and maintain the commitment that Congress made to reduce
Washington spending,” he said in a statement. “It’s time for Democrat
leaders to take ‘yes’ for an answer.”
But Democratic leaders have balked, and they flexed their muscle Sunday
with a group of Democratic and independent senators negotiating with Ms.
Collins.
The Democratic leadership’s hard line has worried some party members.
Ms. Collins said eight Democrats were now involved in negotiations,
including Mr. Manchin and Senator Angus King, an independent from Maine
who caucuses with the Democrats.
But a final deal will be up to Mr. Reid and Mr. Obama.
“The Democratic leadership is clearly very strong and has a lot of sway over its members,” Ms. Collins said.
Underscoring those concerns, six of the senators negotiating with Ms.
Collins — Mr. Manchin, Mr. King, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota, Mark
Pryor of Arkansas, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota and Joe Donnelly of
Indiana — released a joint statement acknowledging involvement in the
talks but saying they could not support the proposal “in its current
form.”
“There are negotiations,” they said, “but there is no agreement.”
