Rep. Andy Harris, R-Md., told Newsmax on Tuesday that the blame for a looming partial government shutdown lies more with the Senate than it does with the House.
"We did much more in the House than the Senate did," Harris said during an appearance on Newsmax's "The Chris Salcedo Show." "The Senate only pushed three bills across the finish line out of 12; we did seven out of 12. All of our bills came out of committee, but then again we hit a brick wall because the Democrats want to continue the [Sen. Chuck] Schumer [D-N.Y.]/[Rep. Nancy] Pelosi [D-Calif.] policies. They want to spend more money than last year and a lot of Republicans are just saying no in the House."
Schumer, the Senate majority leader, and House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., agreed on a $1.59 trillion discretionary spending bill for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1 nearly two months ago, but the bill is being held up by demands from hard-line Republicans in the House who want to see deeper spending cuts and policy positions attached to budget dollars.
The federal government has been brought to the brink of a shutdown or a partial shutdown three times in the past six months because lawmakers failed to pass the 12 separate appropriations bills that fund the various departments and agencies. It has been kept afloat by short-term spending bills known as continuing resolutions.
In recent days, Schumer and Johnson have pointed fingers in an attempt to cast blame over which chamber is to blame for the congressional stalemate.
On Monday, Schumer told reporters that "Democrats are doing everything we can to avoid a shutdown."
President Joe Biden met with congressional leadership from both sides of the aisle on Tuesday in a bid to kick-start progress on the $1.59 trillion spending package and avert a partial shutdown.
According to reports, funding for agencies that oversee agriculture and transportation is set to expire on Friday at midnight, while funding for some other agencies, including the Pentagon and State Department, will run out on March 8.
Harris reiterated his claim to Newsmax that the Senate has slow-walked the spending bills the House sent over and has done very little work.
"We put seven bills over in the Senate; the Senate hasn't taken up a single one of them," he said. "The bottom line is that Congress is broken, the process in Washington is broken, and it spends way too much money, and it doesn't have it. It has record debt and deficits out into the future – we've got to stop doing business like this."
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Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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