U.S. govt shutdown extended as crunch vote delayed

The U.S. government shutdown is slated to come to an end on Monday, as lawmakers in the Senate voted in favor of a short-term funding deal that would fund the government through February 8.

Late Monday, members of the House of Representatives voted for the bill approved earlier in the day in the Senate.

As part of negotiations last week to end the government shutdown, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer offered to fund part of President Donald Trump’s proposed border wall in exchange for protections for the almost 700,000 unauthorized immigrants in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Democrats have been spearheading an effort to protect about 700,000 young Dreamers after Trump announced in September the end of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program instituted by his Democratic predecessor, Barack Obama.

In a speech on the Senate floor, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) announced that he and Senate Majority Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) reached a deal to re-open the government until February 8.

“In a few hours, the government will reopen”, Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer of NY said ahead of the vote.

“I think we’ve been very clear that any final solution has to include funding for a wall and we’ve been working closely with President Trump on that”, he added.

“Importantly, when I proceed to the immigration debate, it will have an amendment process that is fair to all sides”, he said.

In the days leading up to the shutdown, Democratic lawmakers and strategists assumed Trump would take a “wall for Dreamers” deal, even pointing to Rep. Luis Guitierrez, D-Illinois, an immigration advocate, who has half-jokingly offered to help build Trump’s wall.

“I said before trust but verify”, he said of Senator McConnell. Now there is a real pathway to get a bill on the floor and through the Senate. As is often his practice, Trump told few people of his plans to ask Schumer to the White House for talks.

“How can you negotiate with the president under those circumstances where he agrees face to face to move forward with a certain path and then within two hours calls back and pulls the plug?” asked Senator Dick Durbin on ABC’s This Week on Sunday.

Vice President Mike Pence, however, signaled in a speech to US troops stationed in the Middle East that immigration reform isn’t on the table until the government is up and running again.

Inside the White House, the official said, there are serious doubts that Democrats will hold up their end of an immigration bargain. In essence, the government reopens with things largely where it closed.

Schumer called on Trump to return to the bargaining table. “We want a big deal that solves the reason that we have a DACA problem in the first place”, Mulvaney said on CNN.

Democrats believe they have the backing of their constituents when it comes to taking a hard stance on DACA.

The government has been running on a series of short-term budget bills since October 1 because Congress has been unable to agree on a year-long spending package.

The US government shutdown is set to sow more disruption and political peril today after the Senate inched closer but ultimately fell short of an agreement that would have reopened federal agencies before the beginning of the workweek.

It looks like the government shutdown will end soon.

Senator Angus King of ME, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, said he was a “strong” yes.