The partial government shutdown tied the second longest in history on Tuesday, entering its 18th day with little signs of progress.
The continued closure of nine government agencies adds a new sense of urgency to the situation as negotiations seem to have broken down. The White House has largely doubled down on its demands for border wall funding and Democrats have refused to include any money for it.
President Donald Trump is expected to make his case to the public on Tuesday evening in a primetime television address. The address comes before a planned presidential trip the the southern border Thursday.
In a message posted to Twitter Monday, the president said he would outline what he calls the “Humanitarian and National Security crisis on our Southern Border.” The major networks agreed to carry the president’s address, prompting Democratic leadership to demand equal time for a response.
It is possible that the president will declare a national emergency during the address that will circumvent Congress and trigger laws that could allow him to build the wall using already-appropriated military funding. Legal scholars have said that any such attempt is likely to get held up in the courts.
Vice President Mike Pence said Monday that the president is examining the possibility. On Friday, the president declared from the White House Rose Garden that he “could do it if I wanted” but stated his preference for a “negotiated” solution.
Yet, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer remain adamant that they will not support any bill that contains wall funding.
In a joint statement released on Monday, the two Democratic leaders said that they expected the president’s television address to be “full of malice and misinformation.”
That statement followed a weekend of bipartisan meetings with Vice President Mike Pence, White House senior advisor Jared Kushner and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen that yielded no progress.
A Democratic aide told CNBC that the administration during a meeting with Democratic staff “doubled down on their partisan proposal” and has continued to press for bills that cannot pass in Congress.
Pence and Nielsen are expected to attempt to rally Republicans around the president’s position on Tuesday, POLITICO reported.
The outlet cited a GOP aide who said that the party leadership counts as many as 25 members who are likely to vote with Democrats on a House bill Wednesday that would return funding to the IRS and other agencies.
In the Senate, some Democrats representing large numbers of government workers have floated a new strategy. Maryland Sens. Ben Cardin and Chris Van Hollen proposed refusing to vote on any new Senate bill that does not re-open the government.
Schumer has told his caucus that he will oppose proceeding to a vote on the first bill of the new Congress until the chamber takes up House bills that will re-open the government, CNN reported.
The political posturing comes as the administration wrestles with how to ameliorate the affects of the shutdown on millions of Americans who work for the government or rely on its services.
Since the start of the shutdown, approximately 800,000 government workers have been out of work or working without pay. The unintended effects include a buildup of trash in the nation’s national parks and long lines at airports, where security workers are increasingly calling out sick.
The White House on Monday sought to temporarily remedy some of the effects that the closure, announcing that the IRS would issue refunds despite its lapsed funding, a break with previous administrations.
The acting director of the Office of Management and Budget, Russ Vought, told reporters that key government services such as resuming trash pickup at national parks and the sale of flood insurance under the National Flood Insurance Program would continue.
— CNBC’s Kevin Breuninger contributed to this report.
