CNBC host Joe Kernen told House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries that his party would be “going crazy” if the Republicans shut down the government over Democrat-led legislation that they did not like.
The Democrats shut down the government on Oct. 1 over there being no extension of Biden-era subsidies in the Affordable Care Act and due to the large tax cuts in the “big, beautiful bill” that passed in July. On “Squawk Box,” Kernen criticized the Democrats for withholding paychecks for government workers as they demanded that Republicans give them what they want.
“There was an election and the Republicans were put in a position where they were able to pass the ‘big, beautiful bill.’ You call it the ‘big, ugly bill.’ To then say we don’t like any of that so we’re gonna shut down the government until you take back all the things that you duly passed through legislation,” Kernen said. “If Republicans had tried to do that to the Inflation Reduction Act or any of the acts that the Biden administration had passed. If they said we’re gonna shut down the government because we don’t like any of those things you did, we’re gonna not pay our military, we’re not gonna let the government reopen until you do what we want. After an election where the American people put Democrats in power, you would be going crazy.”
“You’d be going crazy about using the shutdown of the government on a continuing resolution to get what you want just because you don’t like what the Republicans did,” Kernen continued. “It’s bad. It’s bad precedent and it’s just clear, and you’re talking about the House. You’ve already passed this.”
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Jeffries then attempted to turn Kernen’s criticisms around on Republicans, stating that they refused to engage in negotiations with Democrats. He claimed that Republicans have the power to reopen the government because they control both chambers of Congress.
“They’ve made the decision to shut the government down. And they could reopen it right now if they chose to,” Jeffries said.
“How could they do that?” Kernen asked.
“I just explained it. The reality is they want to keep the government closed, cruelty from the very beginning of this administration has been the point. And the responsible thing to do is to sit down and negotiate a bipartisan path forward,” Jeffries continued.
House Speaker Mike Johnson has repeatedly stated that Congress can debate an extension of Obamacare tax credits after they passed the continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government.
Jeffries, along with former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats, have falsely stated that the funding bill is not a “clean CR,” which is a temporary spending bill to fund the government at existing spending levels. The Committee for a Responsible Budget, a non-partisan organization, stated that the resolution was “as clean of a C.R. as you could get,” according to The New York Times.
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