On December 13, Senate Appropriations Chair Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) told a group of reporters that a partial government shutdown may be all but certain. “It looks like we could be headed down the road to nowhere,” Sen. Shelby said. “That’s what it looks like at the moment because we’ve got nine days to go.”
However, he also told the reporters that there are a lot of “thoughts” about how to keep the nine departments and assorted agencies that don’t yet have full-year spending bills open beyond Dec. 21, but said none of those have been formalized.
Shelby said the options being discussed include passing a temporary funding extension until the day after Christmas, passing a continuing resolution until Jan. 3 at 11:59 p.m. (just after the beginning of the next Congress), passing a stopgap spending bill until late January, or February, or possibly May. There are also discussions about advancing a continuing resolution that would last until the end of fiscal year 2019 on Sept. 30.
On December 11, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer sat down with President Trump at the White House in an effort to discuss a potential government shutdown if an omnibus appropriations bill is not passed by December 21st (which includes Interior and Environment funding) and Trump’s insistence $5 billion be included for a border wall in any final bill, an amount most Democrats and some Republicans are opposed to. (Roll Call, 12/13/18) During the meeting President Trump stated he is prepared to shut down the federal government if an agreement to fund the border wall is not included in the final FY19 funding package.
