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At his now-daily press conference at the Capitol, House Speaker Mike Johnson said he supports furloughed federal workers getting back pay once the shutdown is over.
“It’s my understanding that the law is that they would be paid. There is some other legal analysis that is floating around. I have yet had time to dig into and read that, but it has always been the case, that is tradition and I think it is statutory law, that federal employees be paid, and that’s my position. And I think they should be. They should not be subjected to harm and financial dire straits because Chuck Schumer wants to play political games.”
He also threw cold water on the idea of bringing the House back to vote on separate legislation to pay members of the military, saying House Democrats had their chance to support the continuing resolution that would have avoided the shutdown.
“Hakeem Jeffries and the House Democrats … are clamoring to get back here and have another vote, because some of them want to get on record and say they’re for paying the troops. We already had that vote. It’s called the CR,” Johnson said. “Every Republican and at least one Democrat had the common sense to say, ‘Of course we want the government to stay in operation, of course we want to pay our troops and our air traffic controllers and our Border Patrol agents, TSA and everybody else.’ We did have that vote.”
He continued: “They live with that vote. They made that decision. The House is done. The ball is now in the Senate’s court. It does us no good to be here dithering on show votes.”
The speaker said Republicans are “not asking the Democrats to do anything heroic.”
“We’re asking them to do their basic duty and responsibility,” Johnson said. “I’m sorry, I’m aggravated. The first responsibility of the government is to protect the people. And the people who are supposed to be protected are being completely cheated by Democrats in the Senate because they want to play politics.”
