Latest on Congress as shutdown looms

Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer announced on Wednesday night that Democrats reached an agreement with Republicans on a continuing resolution to fund the government and they will be voting on it tomorrow morning. 

“We have an agreement on the CR – the continuing resolution to prevent a government shutdown – and we should be voting on that tomorrow morning,” Schumer said.

Schumer said beginning at 10:30 a.m. ET on Thursday the Senate will hold several amendment votes before they vote on the continuing resolution. 

The House is expected to take the measure up once the Senate has acted. Government funding expires at midnight, but Democratic leaders have projected confidence that there will not be a shutdown. 

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi walks off the House floor following a procedural vote on suspending the debt limit on Wednesday, September 29.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she still plans to hold a vote on the infrastructure plan tomorrow — “that’s the plan” she said, adding she’s taking it “one hour at a time”

Pelosi also told CNN she does not support going through the process known as “budget reconciliation” to raise the national debt ceiling on just Democratic votes. (Reconciliation bills cannot be filibustered and can pass with just 51 votes in the Senate.)

Democrats have been resisting GOP calls to go this route over concerns over the unwieldy process on the floor that would open them to a flurry of politically charged amendments on the Senate floor. Democrats argue it would take too long to go through that process and stave off default; Republicans disagree.

And Pelosi went further than she has before, making clear she won’t go that route. 

“Yes,” she said when asked if she’s ruled out using that process. “I mean, I have.”

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, a Democrat who leads a powerful progressive faction in the House, said she believes any vote planned for tomorrow on the infrastructure package will be delayed.

“If we do have a vote, then we’ll vote it down and then continue the negotiations so that we can actually deliver the entirety of the President’s agenda,” she said, after predicting the vote would be delayed.

Jayapal, the chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, made the remarks just minutes after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told CNN that the vote on the hard infrastructure deal was still planned for Thursday.

The hard infrastructure package “might have to go down tomorrow and that’s okay,” added Jayapal. “We’ll do that and then we will continue to negotiate.”

Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin urged his Democratic colleague, Sen. Joe Manchin, this evening to support Democrats’ spending package now, rather than waiting until later in the year. 

“I would urge Joe, ‘if you believe there’s value and merit to the programs in the reconciliation bill, don’t wait. Do it now,’” said Durbin, the Senate’s second most powerful Democrat.

Durbin was responding to a statement Manchin made earlier in the afternoon, in which he indicated he’d be open to an economic bill by the end of the year but confirmed that he’s not ready to vote for one now.

Manchin’s decision could spell trouble for Democratic leadership in the House who hope to pass a hard infrastructure deal this week. Many progressive lawmakers in the caucus are linking that vote to the larger economic spending package.

“I would say to him, we can’t delay these things,” Durbin said, speaking on CNN. “Simply delaying them is just inviting a bad result… we’re one heartbeat away from losing the majority in the United States Senate.”

The House has voted 219-212 to suspend the nation’s debt limit until Dec. 16, 2022.

Two Democrats — Rep. Kurt Schrader of Oregon and Rep. Jared Golden of Maine — joined Republicans in voting against the bill.

GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger was the only Republican to vote with Democrats for the bill. 

This bill now heads to the Senate, where it will fail.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer are meeting with President Biden at the White House as his agenda hangs in the balance, sources familiar told CNN. 

The majority leader walked into the West Wing at 4 p.m. ET. 

The trio have been speaking almost daily for the last week by phone and that was originally supposed to be the case, according to a source.

That shifted in the hour before they arrived at the White House, though it’s unclear exactly why.

The meeting is expected to address the latest on the White House efforts with the two moderate senators, as well as the state of the scheduled House vote on the infrastructure package tomorrow, the source said.

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, speaks with reporters at the Capitol in Washington, DC, Wednesday, September 29.

House Republican leaders are launching an all-out campaign to sink a bipartisan infrastructure bill, as Democratic leaders struggle to unite their caucus around the legislation ahead of a high-stakes floor vote on Thursday.

While the $1.2 trillion infrastructure package contains popular items widely supported by both parties — and earned the backing of 19 Republicans in the Senate — GOP leaders in the House want to ensure that Republicans won’t be the reason the bill gets over the finish line, and have begun to crank up the pressure on their members.

​​Both House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy and House Minority Whip Steve Scalise have been making personal calls to members and talking to members on the floor, according to GOP sources. And while Republican leaders are not threatening members who back the bill, they are being forceful with their pitches, those sources said.

“Our argument is that infrastructure is a gateway drug to reconciliation,” a source familiar with the whip operation said.

The source expects between a dozen and 20 House Republicans will vote “yes” on the legislation, but said it wouldn’t be enough to offset the mass defections progressives are threatening if the bill comes to the floor without a deal on legislation to expand the social safety net through reconciliation.

“There won’t be enough Republicans to carry this if there is widespread opposition,” the person said. 

One Republican member said the whipping operation was “pretty intense.” Another Republican described the effort as an “8 out of 10.” And a third House Republican said “we’re very serious about it.”

While GOP leaders have acknowledged that there will be some Republicans who cross party lines, Scalise said at a press conference earlier this week that they will “work to keep that number as low as we possibly can.”

The scramble to limit GOP defections underscores just how high the stakes are for both parties. President Biden’s domestic agenda is on the verge of imploding as Democratic leaders struggle to unite the warring factions inside their party. And Republicans — keenly aware that the passage of infrastructure and reconciliation may be Democrats’ best hope for keeping their majorities next year — are eager to keep the spotlight on the disarray across the aisle.

CNN’s Daniella Diaz and Ryan Nobles contributed reporting to this post.

President Biden is “disappointed” in Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s refusal to work with Democrats to raise the country’s debt limit, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Wednesday. 

Asked if the President was surprised McConnell wouldn’t vote to raise the debt ceiling as he has done in the past, Psaki paused before saying “surprised is an interesting way to phrase the question.” 

The press secretary said President Biden and Senator McConnell have worked together in the past and also of course have their disagreements, but said there should be bipartisan support in raising the debt limit, as there has been in the past. 

“At the end of the day, protecting the full faith and credit of the United States, ensuring we’re paying our bills, ensuring we’re not going to have a devastating impact on American families, we’re not going to see the markets drop is something that there should be bipartisan support for and there has been historically. So disappointed,” Psaki said. 

Senate Republicans, led by McConnell, have insisted that they won’t join Democrats in a bipartisan vote to suspend the debt limit and have called for Democrats to act on their own to address the issue.

However, the White House pointed to multiple votes in the past, including three during the Trump administration, where both parties came together to raise the debt limit. 

“So in his view, this is something that has been done in a bipartisan manner, it should be something that is not political, because everybody should believe that we need to protect the full faith and credit of the United States, and we’re disappointed that that’s not the view shared by Republicans right now.”

White House press secretary Jen Psaki answers questions during a press briefing on September 29.

White House press secretary Jen Psaki would not say whether moderate Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema have given the administration a topline number that would be acceptable to them for the economic package, a key holdup to any movement on President Biden’s agenda.

Psaki declined to weigh in on a topline number multiple times throughout the briefing, passing the question off to the senators to announce what they are comfortable with.

When asked if the White House was frustrated that it doesn’t know where the senators’ bottom line is, Psaki said that the administration doesn’t have the luxury of getting frustrated.

In response to a comment Speaker Nancy Pelosi made earlier Wednesday saying she hopes to see legislative text on the larger Build Back Better Act agreed to before a key Thursday vote, Psaki said the administration is working in lockstep with the speaker and has confidence in her leadership of the Democratic caucus.

“We certainly trust Speaker Pelosi. We’re working in lockstep and around the clock to get both of these pieces of legislation done,” she said.

The Senate parliamentarian on Wednesday rejected Democrats’ second attempt to try to include a pathway to legalization for immigrants in a bill that could be passed with just Democratic support, a source tells CNN.

Democrats argued this time to the parliamentarian that they include a provision to change the registry date from 1972 to 2010 for the legalization of immigrants and it could be passed using budget reconciliation.

The effort to include immigration in their economic agenda bill, although it has faced long odds, has stood as one of the last clear opportunities for Democrats to pass substantial immigration reform in President Biden’s first year in office.

Senate parliamentarian Elizabeth MacDonough, an official who advises the Senate on how its rules, protocols and precedents should be applied, rejected Democrats’ second argument after they submitted a memo Tuesday.

The source stressed to CNN they believed this fight for including immigration reform “is not over,” but this is — again — a huge loss for Democrats who want to include these provisions as a last-ditch effort for reform.

The ruling marks the latest setback for Democrats who have pinned their hopes of passing immigration reform this year on the economic package.

Immigrant advocacy groups were disappointed by the parliamentarian’s earlier ruling against a separate proposal to include legalization, but remained optimistic. Sergio Gonzales, Immigration Hub’s executive director, said at the time the decision “is not the final straw.”

Those hopes, though, might be dimming.

For years, Congress has tried and failed to pass legislation to provide a pathway to citizenship or otherwise address the immigration system. In the absence of legislation, the Obama administration and now, the Biden administration has relied on DACA to ensure the group known as “Dreamers” — many of whom are now adults — can stay and work in the US.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told reporters she does not believe the government will shut down tomorrow and that the House will pass a continuing resolution to fund the government. 

“No I do not,” Pelosi said when asked if she believed the government will shut down tomorrow.

“I think we’ll have a big vote tomorrow,” the Speaker added.

The House is expected to vote on suspending the debt limit later today, which was taken out of the government funding bill. 

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, center, departs after a meeting with House Democrats at the US Capitol on September 27.

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the leader of the progressive caucus, is very skeptical that a deal can be struck on the spending bill that will satisfy progressives before tomorrow’s planned vote on the bipartisan infrastructure deal.

Jayapal said the reason she is doubtful that both can be accomplished is because she thinks many of her members won’t feel comfortable unless there is a an actual vote on the bill in the Senate, because so much can happen procedurally in the upper chamber. 

“That said, I think it’s pretty difficult because what we have called for, is a vote in the Senate, and I’ve spoken to the speaker about this, that, you know, the legislative language is absolutely important. I’m so glad she said that because it’s a point I’ve made to her as well,” she said.

Jayapal said she is open to hearing options about a path forward that doesn’t include a vote, but she remains skeptical because she believes moderates broke their agreement about passing the two bills together first. 

“I’m open to hearing if there’s some other way to give us assurances, I’m open and willing to listen. But what I don’t want to do is have a situation where we once again trust, and then that trust is broken and then somehow it becomes we reneged on the bargain … that’s not what happened,” Jayapal said.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a Dear Colleague letter that the House will deal with the debt ceiling issue today.

The House is beginning to debate the bill on the floor now.

As Democratic leaders struggle to unite their caucus around the bipartisan infrastructure bill, House Republican leaders have been working overtime to ensure that Republicans won’t be the reason the bill gets over the finish line. 

Since announcing last week they would formally whip the legislation, GOP leaders have been engaged in an all-out operation to make it clear to members that a vote for the bipartisan infrastructure bill is a vote to help Democrats advance their broader agenda.

“Our argument is that infrastructure is a gateway drug to reconciliation,” a source familiar with the whip operation said.

The source says the expectation right now is that between a dozen and 20 House Republicans will vote “yes” on the legislation, but that it wouldn’t be enough to overcome the mass defections progressives say they are planning if the bill comes to the floor.

They did include one caveat, however. If Pelosi were to bring the BIF to the floor and there was an all-out jailbreak of progressives voting “no” tomorrow that could lead to larger GOP “yes” numbers as members would view it as a “freebie.” In other words, their votes wouldn’t be enough to help pass the bill, but they could go home and tout they backed it.

Still, House leaders have been facing one unexpected challenge. The group of Senate Republicans that voted for the bipartisan infrastructure bill and helped craft it are running their own counter programming, circulating fact memos and talking on the phone to House Republicans who have questions about what is inside that bill. One of those members –Sen. Rob Portman– told CNN that he wishes GOP leaders would have remained on the sidelines on this one.

“I would like to have seen them remain neutral,” Portman said.

“I have been talking to House Republicans about it,” Portman said. “Every day I talk to a few… they are going to make their own decisions. I am just providing information.”

“People are confusing the two bills saying that the bad policy that is in the reconciliation bill is in the infrastructure bill, which is not surprising… but they are very different bills.”

Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the leader of the progressive caucus, speaks to reporters outside the US Capitol on Tuesday, September 28.

The progressive outcry against the planned vote on President Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure package didn’t just hold, according to several members it actually grew in numbers over the course of the day.

With 24 hours until Speaker Nancy Pelosi has pledged to hold the infrastructure vote, something needs to unlock, and fast, for Biden and Democratic leaders to have any hope of success.

“Nobody wants to blink, everyone thinks the other side is about to,” said one source involved in the negotiations. “Neither is right about that, which puts us in a very bad place.”

With House Democratic leadership’s self-imposed September 30 deadline to put the infrastructure vote on the floor now a day away, House progressives aren’t budging.

House moderates are still demanding the vote. And Pelosi’s not one to violate her own policy that she won’t go to the floor without knowing she’s going to win.

Right now, progressives claim to have dozens of members ready to vote against Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and there’s been absolutely no indication this is a bluff.

Progressives feel burned. They feel like they are always accepting less to get something and after nine months, they want to prove they aren’t kidding when they say they are standing firm.

“How many bills have we passed in the House that the Senate has not taken up? What about on voting rights? What about the George Floyd Justice in policing? This is not about trust. This is about verify,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the leader of the progressive caucus, said Tuesday.

Read more about where things stand here.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi departs a Democratic whip meeting at the US Capitol on Wednesday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says she has the authority to delay tomorrow’s vote on the bipartisan infrastructure bill during a back-and-forth with a reporter in a gaggle after a caucus meeting.

“The Speaker has that authority (to delay the vote), but I want it to pass. So what we wanted to do is to pass tomorrow, and anything that strengthens the hand of the Speaker helps pass the bill,” she said during the gaggle. 

On the debt ceiling rule today, Pelosi said she doesn’t have “patience” for the handful of moderates who don’t support a separate vote on raising the debt ceiling and could block the bill. 

White House economic adviser Jared Bernstein painted an optimistic picture of Biden’s economic agenda Wednesday, one day before a planned House vote on the bipartisan infrastructure package that progressives are threatening to tank. The infrastructure vote is scheduled just hours before the government could shut down if Congress does not pass a spending bill – and this, just weeks before the US could default if the debt limit is not raised.

Bernstein declined to say what price tag moderate Democrat Sen. Kyrsten Sinema is willing to be on board with, suggesting the administration doesn’t want to talk about the agenda in terms of specific spending amounts.

Brnstein added, “Yes, there are negotiations to be made, and this President continues to leap over every legislative hurdle that has been put in front of him thus far. So I don’t think of this as the week from H-E-double hockey sticks as you were calling it a minute ago, I think it’s the as the week towards just essential investments in progress on behalf of the middle class.”

He declined to speculate on whether the bipartisan infrastructure bill will pass on Thursday, but touted the package’s “strong Democratic support.”

Pressed repeatedly on whether the White House is preparing for the possibility of default if action is not taken on the debt ceiling, Bernstein said, “Default is not an option,” going on to criticize Senate Republicans.

Describing a default as an “economic cataclysm,” he reiterated that default is not an option, adding that Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer “is doing everything he can to get around this Republican-imposed obstacle.

In a moment when President Biden and Democratic leaders sought to create desperately needed momentum to pass key parts of the President’s agenda, everything appeared to turn in the exact opposite direction.

Biden’s meetings with two key Democratic moderates yielded nothing in the form of a tangible — and absolutely necessary — public commitment or acknowledgment of their preferred path forward.

The progressive outcry against the planned vote on Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure package didn’t just hold, according to several members it actually grew in numbers over the course of the day.

With 24 hours until Speaker Nancy Pelosi has pledged to hold the infrastructure vote, something needs to unlock, and fast, for Biden and Democratic leaders to have any hope of success.

Where things stand now: With House Democratic leadership’s self-imposed September 30 deadline to put the infrastructure vote on the floor now a day away, House progressives aren’t budging. House moderates are still demanding the vote. And Pelosi’s not one to violate her own policy that she won’t go to the floor without knowing she’s going to win.

Right now, progressives claim to have dozens of members ready to vote against Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and there’s been absolutely no indication this is a bluff. Progressives feel burned. They feel like they are always accepting less to get something and after nine months, they want to prove they aren’t kidding when they say they are standing firm.

Between a government shutdown, a debt default, a sweeping infrastructure bill and society-transforming economic and climate package, all tied to some form of a looming deadline, the lack of clarity about how Biden, Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer pull it all off — or in Pelosi’s words “land the plane” — is palpable.

Read more about negotiations here.

Sen. Joe Manchin leaves the Senate chamber after a vote on September 28.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi expressed frustration at moderate Democratic Sens. Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, although without naming them directly. 

During this morning’s Democratic caucus meeting she said President Biden is negotiating with lawmakers because he cares so much about both bills, according to a member in the room. She was referring to both the infrastructure and the reconciliation bill.

Pelosi at the start of the weekly Democratic whip meeting pushed hard on Democrats voting for a debt ceiling bill, according to a member who is participating. 

She said Democrats can’t be “accomplices” to Republicans in failing to address the debt ceiling — clearly a suggestion at moderates who might not support the rule for the bill today. 

House Democrats, especially progressives, have been privately and publicly frustrated over Sens. Manchin and Sinema’s refusal to publicly make their positions known or name a top line number they would accept for their party’s massive social and economic agenda.  

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi walks through the halls of the US Capitol on Wednesday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says that they need to have legislative text on the larger Build Back Better Act agreed to by the White House to assure progressives ahead of Thursday vote on infrastructure. She didn’t rule out delaying the Thursday vote either but said they are moving ahead.

Key moderate Sen. Joe Manchin told CNN “that won’t happen” when asked about Pelosi’s comments on needing a deal on “legislative language” with the White House on the larger economic plan to get progressives to support the infrastructure deal by tomorrow.

“No one has been negotiating along those lines with the other parties here,” he said.

“What we – all we need to do is pass the bipartisan infrastructure bill, sit down, and start negotiating in good faith. That’s it,” Manchin said. 

Note: This, of course, is the dilemma. Progressives want Manchin to sign onto legislative language he can support by tomorrow — or they’ll tank the infrastructure bill. He says pass the infrastructure bill first, then we’ll talk.

It will be very hard to get an agreement on legislative language by tomorrow.

Why this matters: The final vote on Biden’s $1.2 trillion Senate-passed infrastructure bill is slated for tomorrow — the same day Congress needs to reach an agreement to avoid a lapse in government funding.

Right now, progressives claim to have dozens of members ready to vote against Biden’s $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and there’s been absolutely no indication this is a bluff. Progressives feel burned. They feel like they are always accepting less to get something and after nine months, they want to prove they aren’t kidding when they say they are standing firm.

The looming deadlines of a potential government shutdown on the same day as the infrastructure bill threaten to thwart Biden’s agenda.

CNN’s Phil Mattingly and Lauren Fox contributed reporting to this post.