The heat is still on President Obama as the federal government on Saturday moved one step closer to default.
Senate Republicans and Democrats continued to battle over whether to extend the government’s debt limit through next year, but negotiations between Democratic Majority Leader Harry Reid and Republican Minority Leader Mitch McConnell faltered as of Saturday evening.
“We haven’t done anything yet,” Reid said.
He and other Democrats held out hope that a compromise would be reached soon, but Tea Party leaders weren’t as optimistic.
Republican Rep. John Fleming of Louisiana said there was “definitely a chance that we’re going to go past the deadline” that Treasury Secretary Jack Lew set for this Thursday for Congress to raise the nation’s $16.7 trillion debt limit.
Lew has said that without legislation to raise the debt limit, default is possible any day, and with it, economic catastrophe.
Obama blamed Republicans for the stalemate. “Manufacturing crises to extract massive concessions isn’t how our democracy works, and we have to stop it,” he said in his weekly radio address.
Effects of the government shutdown varied widely, and in some cases, states and outsiders began stepping in. The Statue of Liberty will reopen Sunday after the New York state government agreed to pick up the $61,600 daily tab for running the site. In South Dakota, the state and corporate donors did the same for Mount Rushmore, beginning on Monday at a cost of $15,200 a day.
But none of that helped matters in the Senate, where much of Saturday’s wrangling took place. Senate Democrats rejected a compromise proposal led by GOP Maine Sen. Susan Collins, while Republicans blocked a measure from Democrats to let the Treasury resume normal borrowing.
A separate measure would be needed to reopen the government after the 13-day shutdown that has resulted in furloughs for 350,000 federal workers.
Officials in both parties said Democrats had raised the possibility with Republicans of a long-term spending bill that included deficit savings and could replace some or all of the across-the-board spending cuts that began taking effect at the beginning of the year.
Polls show all portions of the electorate except Tea Party supporters are increasingly displeased, and Republicans are bearing the brunt of their unhappiness.
“Perhaps he sees this as the best opportunity for him to win the House in 2014,” Fleming said of the president. “It’s very clear to us he does not now, and never had, any intentions of negotiating.”
With Post Wire Services