Jeffries: Dems will return to DC during recess to highlight lack of budget talks

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) announced Tuesday that Democrats will return to Washington early next week, when the House is formally in recess, to highlight the decision of Republican leaders to cancel the final days of session before a scheduled government shutdown. 

“This is the height of irresponsibility and further evidence that Republicans are determined to shut the government down,” Jeffries wrote in a letter to fellow House Democrats. “Democrats will be in town and prepared to get the job done.” 

Jeffries is also hammering President Trump ahead of next week’s shutdown deadline, saying the president “chickened out” for canceling a planned meeting with Democratic leaders this week in search of a bipartisan budget deal. 

“Donald Trump has now chickened out and cancelled the meeting,” Jeffries wrote in his letter. “Clearly, GOP extremists want to shut down the government because they are unwilling to address the Republican healthcare crisis that is devastating America.”

Last week, Jeffries had rallied House Democrats against a short-term funding bill crafted almost exclusively by Republicans. Democrats said they couldn’t support the legislation, known as a continuing resolution (CR), because it did not extend ObamaCare subsidies, which are scheduled to expire on Jan. 1, and other health care issues Democrats consider crucial. While Republicans were able to pass the bill through the House, Senate Democrats used the filibuster to sink it.

Both chambers then left Washington on Friday for a long holiday recess, leaving the budget issue unresolved and heightening the odds that large parts of the federal government would be forced to close their doors on Oct. 1. 

Amid the impasse, Jeffries and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote a letter to Trump requesting a meeting at the White House in search of a breakthrough. On Monday, Trump accepted the request, but reversed course on Tuesday. 

“After reviewing the details of the unserious and ridiculous demands being made by the Minority Radical Left Democrats in return for their Votes to keep our thriving Country open, I have decided that no meeting with their Congressional Leaders could possibly be productive,” Trump posted on Truth Social, the media network that he owns.

The cancellation appears to be part of a broader GOP strategy to force Schumer into dropping his opposition to the House-passed spending bill or risk taking the blame for a shutdown on Oct. 1. In March, Schumer had done just that, joining Republicans to get a similar CR to Trump’s desk even over the howls of Democrats who urged him to hold the line.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) is a part of that pressure campaign. As the House was heading into recess last week, he cancelled two days when the House was scheduled to be in session, Sept. 29 and 30, all but precluding the possibility that the sides could come together to prevent a shutdown on Oct. 1.

It’s that absence of bipartisan negotiations that Jeffries is seeking to spotlight by calling Democrats back to Washington on the two cancelled days.

“Our fight is to cancel the cuts, lower the cost and save healthcare,” he wrote. “The American people are counting on us to stand up for them.” 

Some top Republicans are also wary of being in recess just as the government is set to shut down. Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the chairman of the House Appropriations Committee, said last week that he intends to be in Washington to join any talks that might emerge to prevent a shutdown. 

“I hope we’ll come back,” Cole said Friday. “Our leaders have to make that decision, but I intend to be back here. 

“I don’t think it’s a good look to be home when the government shuts down.”