The government shutdown has entered its second week with no end in sight and ominous signs that the United States was closer to the first default in the nation’s history as Speaker John Boehner ruled out any measure to boost borrowing authority without concessions from President Barack Obama.
Just 10 days before the threat of a default would be imminent, animosity marked the stalemate with a statement from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., accusing Boehner of a credibility problem and calling on him to allow a vote on a straightforward bill to re-open the government.
The shutdown has pushed hundreds of thousands of workers off the job, closed national parks and museums and stopped an array of government services.
The one bright spot on Monday is a significant chunk of the furloughed (a temporary unpaid leave of some employees due to special needs of a company) federal workforce is headed back to work. Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel ordered nearly 350,000 back on the job, basing his decision on a Pentagon interpretation of a law called the Pay Our Military Act.
The Pay Our Military Act is a bill from the 113th United States Congress that would appropriate funds to pay members of the Armed Forces of the United States in the event of the federal government shutdown.
It was also signed into law on September 30, 2013, only hours before the government officially shut down.
Those who remain at home or are working without paychecks are a step closer to getting back pay once the partial government shutdown ends. The Senate could act this week on the measure that passed the House unanimously on Saturday.
Democrats insist that Republicans could easily open the government if Boehner simply allows a vote on the emergency spending bill. Democrats argue that their 200 members in the House plus close to two dozen pragmatic Republicans would back a so-called clean bill, but the Speaker remains hamstrung by his tea party-strong GOP caucus.
Some Republicans, such as Rep. Steve King of Iowa, dismiss the warnings about a government default as an exaggeration, suggesting U.S. credit won’t collapse and calling the talk “a lot of false demagoguery.”
Asked how the standoff might end, Boehner, R-Ohio, said that he was uncertain: “If I knew, I’d tell you.”
When the Treasury had issued a report on Thursday detailing in stark terms what could happen if the government actually defaulted on its obligations to service the national debt.
“A default would be unprecedented and has the potential to be catastrophic,” the Treasury report said. “Credit markets could freeze, the value of the dollar could plummet, U.S. interest rates could skyrocket, and the negative spillovers could reverberate around the world.”