Jenny Goldsberry

Washington Examiner

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) avoided a question about whether he would support another government shutdown at the end of this month.

Congress made history at the end of last year by shutting the government down for the longest period in history, at 43 days. However, the continuing resolution that reopened and funded the government will expire on Jan. 31. Jeffries appeared on NBC News’s Meet the Press on Sunday, where he was asked about the likelihood that his Democratic colleagues would pursue a second shutdown in the last four months.

“Would you support another government shutdown over this battle over healthcare subsidies?” host Kristen Welker asked.

“What we’ve said — first of all, we need to resolve this issue within the next week or so, protect the healthcare of the American people and then continue to fix our broken healthcare system and address the Republican healthcare crisis that’s devastating everyday Americans including as a result of the fact that they enacted the large of the cut to Medicaid in American history,” Jeffries said. “We’ve also said as it relates to the appropriations process that we’ll sit down any time, any place with anyone in order to find a bipartisan path forward to enact a spending agreement that actually makes life better for the American people.”

“As Democrats, we’re committed to driving down the high cost of living that exists in this country. Donald Trump promised on day one of his presidency that Republicans would lower costs. Costs haven’t gone down. Costs have gone up,” Jeffries added. “Why doesn’t Donald Trump and the administration focus on dealing with the affordability crisis? That is not a hoax. It is very real and something meaningful needs to be done about it; that’s the Democratic commitment.”

Meanwhile, Jeffries’s counterpart in the Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) was much clearer about his expectation that there won’t be another shutdown during an interview on ABC News’s This Week on Sunday.

“Do you expect another government shutdown at the end of the month over healthcare?” host George Stephanopoulos asked Schumer.

“No,” Schumer said. “Democrats want to fund the appropriations, the spending bills all the way through 2026. We want to work in a bicameral, bipartisan way to do it, and the good news is our Republican appropriators are working with us, and we’re making good progress in that regard.”

The Washington Examiner reached out to Jeffries, Schumer, and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) for comment.