Support their work product. And of course as senator mcconnell, our majority leader likes to point out, there is one indispensable person when it comes to legislation, and thats the person who signs it. All of us write the legislation, but the president is the one who ultimately decides p whether its going to become law. Thats a serious problem in terms of their plan to move forward with the socalled grahamdurbin proposal. And it was i guess last week i lose track of the days now where we met at the white house where majority leader mccarthy suggested that he and i as the majority whip in the senate, minority whip in the senate, senator durbin, for whom this has been a long, passionate cause, and also the minority leader in the house, mr. Hoyer, get together and schedule a tkpwraoufpl meetings to try a group of meetings to try to work out our differences and build consensus because nothing happens unless consensus is achieved, as we all know. So actually i think the belief, in my view, the unrealistic belief that somehow the grahamdurbin bill was going to be the path forward without the president s signature, with a doubtful future in the house of representatives, hopefully thats been set aside. I say that with Great Respect because im not, i dont want to indicate or send any signal that i dont appreciate their concern or their passion or their effort to try to come up with a solution here. Its just that i think it should be clear to everyone that that is not going to be the path forward because of the circumstances i mentioned. The president doesnt support it, and it wont pass in the house of representatives and even get to the pr edz president s tkefbgt. So we find ourselves here in a completely unnecessary situation. Our democratic colleagues were pretty unanimous with, i guess, four or five exceptions in voting down a fourweek continuing resolution and causing the government to shut down. The majority leader, senator mcconnell, has offered them another proposal which is a threeweek continuing resolution while we continue to do our other work, and they objected to voting on that last night. But the majority leader has now filed for cloture, which means that will ripen here tomorrow. And so they have a choice. They can keep the government shut down for another day before we vote on that or we could agree to vote on it today and reopen the government while we continue our goodfaith negotiations and discussions about these other matters. But when the democratic leader came to the floor and said he doesnt want to hurt the military and he doesnt want to hurt people who are suffering from opioid addiction, he doesnt want to hurt the veterans, he doesnt want to hurt people who are relying on the government for a pension or people who are relying on the federal government for disaster relief, and so he objected to the continuing resolution and caused the government shutdown, i have to say thats a strange way of showing your devotion and your support for the military or veterans or opioid addicts or people who are depending on the federal government to come up with disaster relief. Shutting down the government helps none of them, none of them at all. And when he talks about continuing resolutions hurting the military, i agree with that. But the very thing thats hurting the military the most is the shutdown and the uncertainty. Our National Guard cant train, for example. So the solution to this long term or actually short term, and it should be short term, is an agreement on spending caps so the Appropriations Committee can come up with an appropriations bill that will fund the government through the end of september, through the end of the fiscal year. But whats really happened here unfortunately is our colleagues across the aisle have listened to the most extreme elements in their Political Party and shut down the government over an unrelated immigration issue that doesnt even ripen until march 5. Now i say that just to say it doesnt have to be decided today, nor can it be decided today, but thats what theyre trying to hold all of the rest of us hostage in order to do. All across the country the headlines reflect the reality, from the Associated Press it reads Senate Democrats derail bill to avert shutdown. And even the New York Times read, Senate Democrats block a bill to keep government open past midnight. And i cant help but share in the frustration of those who in disgust find us in a situation that we dont want to be in and that makes absolutely no sense to anybody. Because everything in the continuing resolution that our colleagues across the aisle voted against last night are things they support. Support for the military. Support for the opioid treatment. Support for veterans. But they voted against it in order to hold all of that hostage to this unrelated issue of immigration. Well, the minority leader, my friend from new york, senator schumer, has done the best he can to try to spin the story and to try to explain his strategy and to cast blame. And i have to admire his talent. Senator schumer is my friend. Weve worked together on a number of items in a bipartisan way to come up with solutions to complicated issues. And hes a very talented and smart person. But not even he can come up with a credible story here for why he chose to lead this shutdown effort for the federal government, because it makes no sense whatsoever. And he does have my sympathy. Hes the leader of a tough group of senators, including some radical members who are running for president and who have held the rest of their conference hostage and done them no good service leading him down this boxed canyon only to find the government shut down. How do we know this is their plan all along . Well, the democratic whip, the senior senator from illinois, laid out the strategy in the Washington Post last november. Last november. He said it says senator Richard Durbin of illinois said hes encouraging his colleagues to join him in blocking legislation if the issue on the dreamers is not resolved. That was last november he was already plotting the shutdown we find ourselves in today for this unrelated issue that we are committed to working on on a bipartisan basis. So the minority leader cant convince us or anybody that knows the facts that this is somehow president trumps fault. This is their plan, something they have been whrogt for they have been plotting for a long time now, and now they find themselves in a position that not even they can explain how this helps the country or how this helps these young daca recipients. Its not going to change anything for them to shut down the government. As a matter of fact, i think it just polarizes people and makes things worse. Well, were not going to let him hold Health Insurance for nine million children hostage over an unrelated immigration issue. Thats the childrens Health Insurance program. This bill that they filibustered last night would reauthorize this program for the most vulnerable nine million children in the country. For what . Well, they support that bill. It was voted out on a bipartisan basis out of the Senate Finance committee, and they come to the senate floor and they kill it. Nine million vulnerable children. And they support it. Its a strange way of showing it. Well, clearly the American People deserve better. Soon our colleagues across the aisle will have a chance to reopen the federal government, a chance to abandon this brinkmanship which threatens the safety and security of the country, that threatens the very people we depend upon to defend us and their families. And it threatens the access to health care for nine million vulnerable children. They need to fix this. They need to do the right thing for the American People. And they can do that today by agreeing to vote on this threeweek continuing resolution that will take us to february 8 while we continue to work on this issue relating to the, to daca, the deferred action for childhood arrivals, what we talked about earlier. Or they can do it tomorrow and keep the government shut down for another 24 hours. My message to them is think about the men and women who put on the uniform of our country and deploy in dangerous locations around the globe to fight our nations wars and to protect our homeland. Think about those who wake up in the morning and put on a badge and go out possibly into harms way to protect our communities. And think about those nine million children who depend on us for their Health Coverage. I hope after having had a few hours of sleep last night and had a chance to think through this fundamentally flawed strategy, our colleagues will reconsider. Mr. President , the country deserves better. I yield the floor and id note the absence of a quorum. The presiding officer the clerk will call the roll. Quorum call quorum call good afternoon. This morning the president has spoken to leader mcconnell, to speaker ryan, to leader mccarthy. He also received updates from secretary nielsen about the impacts of payments not salary not going to our Border Agents. He also spoke with secretary mattis who ghei him an update about 90,000 National Guardsmen and 20,000 Army Reservists who have had their training canceled because of the government shutdown. Additionally additional costs that theyve had to incur including pay and travel costs. We stand here ready to sign bill that the house passed last night, anxious to keep the government open or, i should say, to reopen the government. The white house position, though, remains the same, that we will not negotiate the status of 690,000 unlawful immigrants while hundreds of millions of taxpaying americans including hundreds of thousands of our troops in uniform and Border Agents protecting our country are held hostage by Senate Democrats. We continue to remain anxious to reach a deal on daca, and we look forward to resuming those negotiations as soon as the Senate Democrats reopen the government. The reality hoe that is difficult for, i think, Many Americans to understand is if you put forward a bill that continues funding the government, reauthorizes Health Insurance for nine million children, provides a relief of taxes that democrats and republicans on a bipartisan basis, the rationale for shutting town the government over a bill that republicans and democrats agree with on the basis of saying we will not, with we will not negotiate, we will not reach a resolution to open the government until theres a solution on a tangential issue that remains plenty of time to be solved, i think a lot of americans have a hard time understanding how you make the argument of why were not going to pay our men and women in uniform, our agents serving on the border in order to try to resolve an issue that we also want to resolve related to unlawful residents. We look forward i think that the Senate Majority leader is going to offer, as you know, has already offered a continuing resolution to goes to three weeks instead of the original four weeks. We look forward to that vote. We hope that Senate Democrats will yield and accept that the position is unreasonable and reopen the government to make sure that our men and women in uniform continue to get paid. Director of omb Mick Mulvaney is here to address the status of the update and how its impacting government agencies, and then well take a few questions. Good morning. Good afternoon. A couple Different Things. Walk through some of the, how a lapse in appropriations, a shutdown works. Keep in mind those technical terms, the legal term is actually a lapse in appropriations. So when you saw the notices go out today, they referenced a lapse. That is the formal name for the shutdown. This morning, Early Morning federal workers got notices from their various agencies as to whether they were exempt or furloughed employees. They sort of fell into three categories, either you were exempt and you were to come to work either today or monday depending on your ordinary work schedule, you were absolutely furloughed in which you were not to come to work beginning today, or theres actually a number of people who would show up for a few hours on monday or today, up to four hours, in order to close down shop or prepare for the lapse. So those notices went out today. I mentioned yesterday that this shutdown, this lapse would look different than it did in 2013. Were already seeing evidence of that, im going to walk you folks through a couple ways its already different. In 2013 most of the epa shut down immediately during the, during the lapse. Epa this year, consistent with omb guidance and direction from the president , is using its unobligated balance, what we call carryforward funds. Most of the agency will remain open. Mine safety inspection, the number of inspectors that will be on the job for mine safety inspections will increase from 25 of the total of 2013 to 50 . Here again part of the administrations intentional plan to use unobligated funds that are already at the agency, something the Previous Administration did not emphasize. Cybersecurity, agencies will insure that staff working on the maintenance and safeguarding of i. T. Systems will continue to work during the lapse, and systems will continue to get critical updates. National parks, you may have already noticed that. The parks, national monuments, private concessions that serve them are open. As i mentioned yesterday, wont be picking up the trash or cleaning the bathrooms. Number five, trade negotiations. During the last shutdown, i think the Obama Administration canceled a very few highlevel trade negotiations. By contrast, this year the ustr will use its funding flexibilities, we talked, again, ant that, ability to use transfer of funds from one account to another in order to continue around six of the nafta negotiations later week. Finally, the last example i have is that the Merchant Marine Academy was closed during the 2013 shutdown, will stay open. Theres another important example that doesnt compare apples to apples to 2013, but it is sort of evidence of how were managing this differently than the democrats did during the 2013 shutdown. After working closely with the white house, with omb to review the exceptions allowed in the law for agencies to continue to operate if their work is necessary to protect life and safety, the cdc has announced this morning they will continue Immediate Response work and surveillance to protect americans from seasonal influenza. So well have continued updates on that either later today or tomorrow as to how this shutdown, how the lapse if it continues is managed. With that, i think well take a couple of questions. Gentleman in the back. Yes, wondering how concerned you are that when we look at social media, twitter, hashtags trending that trump shutdown seems to be far surpassing democrat shutdown or gop shutdown. How concerned are you that to pus of this by the the onus seems to be on the president . My favorite is still the schumer shutdown. Thats got a nice little ring to it. Yes, sir. You left the meeting yesterday with the president thinking he had arrived at the broad outlines of a deal and something happened that the president changed his mind. Senator schumer said he relented under pressure from the far right. Whats your account of that meeting . Whats the white house of that i was in that meeting. I l i did talk to the chief about it this morning. And ill give you an example of how mr. Schumer is mischaracterizing the discussion. One of the things, according to the k450e6, mr. Schumer told the president i will give you all the money you want for your wall, and the president said, oh, thats great, i need 20 billion, and mr. Schumer said, oh,nt no, no, no, only 1. 6, thas all you asked for last year in the objection. Mr. Heller once again, washington, d. C. Has lost its mind. At the expense of our troops and their families, at the expense of our veterans, and expense of our Childrens Health care. And to me this is politics at its very worse. Just like every american in the and the public thats out there, im frustrated. Im frustrated that i have to come to the floor, talk about congress once again failing the American Public by not doing our jobs. At the risk of sounding like a broken record, time after Time Congress has blown past our deadline to complete all the current fiscal year appropriations and have punted on our responsibilities and now today the government has been shut down. And for years ive been talking about how its congress most basic responsibility to create a budget and pass all the appropriation bills on time. While some things in the senate changes, others just stay the same. While the majority has been working to restore normal budgeting practices, im disappointed that my colleagues across the aisle have spent their time doing everything they can to avoid deadlines and to choose the routes of not working on appropriation bills and to shut down this government. Not only is this disappointing, its also not a surprise given recent history. I have personally never seen Congress Pass all 12 appropriation bills on time and on its own without an omnibus. Ive said this before and i want to inform my colleagues that congress has been able to accomplish its regular budget and appropriation processes before and in recent history. For example, it happened under president clinton and a republican congress. It happened under president reagan and a democratic congress. And ive always said, that washington is a painfree zone that faces no consequences if members fail to do their jobs. So maybe its time to start facing some pain around here and thats why ive reintroduced and have introduced for years my no budget, no pay act. Regardless of whos in the majority or whos in the