This is Day 13 of the government shutdown. There’s no resolution to this crisis in sight.
The House isn’t in session this week, the Senate returns Tuesday night.
President Donald Trump landed in Israel this morning and was greeted by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, Israeli President Isaac Herzog, Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump, Special Envoy Steve Witkoff and other U.S. and Israeli officials. Trump will address the Knesset in Jerusalem before flying to Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt.
Israel and Hamas have officially begun an exchange of hostages for Palestinian prisoners. Seven Israeli hostages were turned over to the IDF, with as many as 2,000 Palestinian prisoners expected to be released later today.
Capitol Hill crossroads. Back home, Congress faces a critical moment. Especially the GOP-run House, which has pretty much given up any pretense of relevancy during this impasse. An institution that voluntarily shuts itself down for weeks in the midst of a huge clash over federal spending — something that impacts all Americans — isn’t playing a real role in governing.
Yes, the House passed a CR 23 days ago. But Senate Democrats, who instigated this crisis, have rejected it seven times now. So maybe it’s time to go back to the drawing board.
We’ve told you that the cumulative impacts of a shutdown grow the longer it lasts, and that’s the case here.
On Saturday, Trump ordered the Pentagon to find a way to pay U.S. troops on Oct. 15. Defense Department officials are diverting $8 billion in previously appropriated research and development funding, per our own Briana Reilly. It’s not clear that the Pentagon can do this legally, but leaders in both parties are privately happy Trump did.
Yet one of the main pressure points for ending the shutdown is resolved for the moment, meaning the devastating stalemate could go on for even longer. Hundreds of thousands of civilian federal employees have been furloughed and aren’t getting paid. This includes air-traffic controllers, Customs and Border Patrol and ICE agents, Federal Bureau of Prisons guards, the FBI and CIA — the gamut of tough, dangerous jobs. Federal contractors are suffering as well.
As they warned, Trump and OMB Director Russ Vought started firing thousands of federal workers on Friday. Some agencies were particularly hard hit, including Treasury and HHS. However, Trump administration officials quickly rescinded the firing of hundreds of CDC scientists who deal with dangerous epidemics. It’s a ritual that’s become a standing operating procedure since the DOGE era.
The Ghost House. Speaker Mike Johnson and top House GOP leaders have kept members home since Sept. 19. While the complaints are growing louder inside House GOP ranks over the issue, Johnson insists Republicans have done their job and there’s no reason for them to be here.
House GOP lawmakers passed a “clean” CR that would keep federal agencies open until Nov. 21. Senate Democrats have repeatedly blocked that measure, which led to this shutdown. Democrats are demanding a vote on their own proposal to permanently extend expiring Obamacare premium credits, a rollback in massive Medicaid cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and the end of unilateral spending rescissions.
Yet the House’s absence makes it easier for the shutdown to continue. Part of what ends shutdowns is anxiety building among the rank-and-file. Members are home, so there’s limited pressure on House GOP leaders to do anything. House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries and dozens of Democrats have been in D.C. throughout the shutdown.
More importantly, Johnson has emerged as the “face” of the shutdown for House Republicans. He’s doing daily press conferences and more media interviews, putting himself in the center of the fracas. A C-SPAN caller begging Johnson to bring the House back last week went viral.
So did Johnson’s hallway confrontation with Arizona Democratic Sens. Ruben Gallego and Mark Kelly over Johnson’s refusal to swear in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, a move that has infuriated Democrats.
Grivalja would be the 218th signature for a discharge petition mandating a floor vote on releasing the Jeffrey Epstein files. House GOP leaders think Trump will be furious if the discharge petition gets that vote, mainly because it will be viewed as Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) besting the president. The petition will fail in the Senate and Trump will never sign it. But the symbolism is important.
Johnson sent the House home early in July because of an internal House GOP rebellion over the Epstein case, and months later, it remains a problem for Johnson and the White House.
OBBB and done. The reality is that since the OBBB passed on July 3, the House has been checked out. A virtual non-entity for more than three months. And this is the off-year, when Congress is supposed to be busy.
Since July 3, the House has only been in session for 20 days (out of more than 100 calendar days.) Even accounting for the normal August break — which began early because of the Epstein mess – the House has been AWOL.
There have been just over 90 floor votes during this period. A lot of these were amendment votes or votes on non-controversial suspension bills. Several were partisan FY2026 spending bills that have no chance of passage. All in all, very little of substance has been taken up. But as Johnson will remind you, the House did pass a CR.
The only period comparable to this in recent decades was in 2020, during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic. Former Speaker Nancy Pelosi used proxy voting to buttress the Democratic leadership’s power. Republicans yelled loudly about that at the time, even filing an unsuccessful lawsuit to stop it. But a similar thing is happening in reverse now.
If you see it, don’t say it. House Republicans have done virtually no oversight on the Trump administration, rolling over on a number of issues that their predecessors would have screamed loudly about. It’s true that House Democrats did little or nothing to rein in President Joe Biden when they controlled the House. But Trump has gone far beyond Biden in using executive authority. “Inside the White House, top advisers joke that they are ruling Congress with an ‘iron fist,’” the Wall Street Journal reported.
For an institution that has complained for years about the need to claw back power from the executive branch, it’s a sad state of affairs. And it shows no sign of ending soon.
