U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) delivers remarks and holds up a copy of a “clean CR” following a meeting with Congressional Democrats and U.S. President Donald Trump at the White House on September 29, 2025 in Washington, DC. Congressional leaders met with President Trump to negotiate funding legislation to avoid a government shutdown. Thune was accompanied by (L-R) Director of the Office of Management and Budget Russell Vought, Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-LA) and Vice President JD Vance. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images)
OAN Staff Sophia Flores 5:18 PM – Monday, September 29, 2025
Vice President JD Vance has publicly stated that he believes the federal government will go into its first partial shutdown in nearly seven years on Wednesday night — citing a lack of agreement between Republicans and Democrats.
On Monday, following an hour-long meeting with President Donald Trump, in addition to Democrat and Republican leaders, the vice president spoke to reporters on the White House lawn.
“I think we are headed into a shutdown because the Democrats won’t do the right thing,” Vance stated while flanked by Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (R-La.) and Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.).
“If you look at the original they did with this negotiation, it was a $1.5 trillion spending package, basically saying the American people want to give massive amounts of money, hundreds of billions of dollars to illegal aliens for their health care, while Americans are struggling to pay their health care bills,” Vance said. “That was their initial foray into this negotiation. We thought it was absurd.”
"I think we're headed to a shutdown because the Democrats won't do the right thing."
Johnson and Thune asserted that, should a government shutdown occur, the responsibility would lie with the Democrats’ intransigence.
“To me, this is purely a hostage-taking exercise on the part of the Democrats,” Thune said. “We are willing to sit down and work with them on some of the issues they want to talk about, whether it’s an extension of premium tax credits, with reforms, we’re happy to have that conversation. But as of right now, this is a hijacking.”
Democrats, on the other hand, argue that the continuing resolution (CR) isn’t truly bipartisan — which is why they are refusing to support it.
“Their bill has not one iota of Democratic input. That is never how we’ve done this before,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said. “And so it’s up to the Republicans whether they want a shutdown or not.”
Johnson has since denied this argument, maintaining that there aren’t any major Republican agenda items in the resolution.
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