Reid warns: 'We're headed for another shutdown' Both parties are beginning to warn of another budget crisis in September.

It’s only June, but talk of a government shutdown is already growing on Capitol Hill ahead of a September deadline to keep the government funded.

As Senate Democrats stiffen their resolve to block Republican spending bills, Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) put it plainly on Wednesday morning: “We’re headed for another shutdown.”


“They did it once, they’re going to do it again,” Reid said of Republicans. “They want to wait until the fiscal year ends and then close up government.”

Both parties are beginning to warn of another budget crisis in September that could result in the second government shutdown in as many years. Democrats are aiming to use their filibuster leverage in the Senate to drive Republicans to the bargaining table, but the GOP is shrugging off those threats and moving forward on spending bills that appear doomed on the Senate floor.

Still, it’s more than three months before the shutdown deadline. So while both parties may be talking a big game, sizing up the reality of a shutdown threat won’t really be possible until September and much of the current rhetorical fireworks amounts to political posturing.

Reid and his lieutenants are angling to reject a defense spending bill as early as next week that they say uses spending gimmicks to boost defense spending at the cost of domestic priorities. That stance is drawing charges of obstruction from Senate Republicans and moving Congress into a period of budget brinkmanship more than three months before government spending runs dry on Sept. 30.

Republicans have already gone on offense, accusing Democrats of threatening military readiness and picking a battle they can’t win.

“They’re committing political suicide, they just don’t realize it yet,” said Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas). “This is a bad strategy. They’ve taken a hostage they can’t shoot.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is spurning attempts from Democrats to sit down with the president and congressional leaders to hash out a broad budget deal.

Instead, he is turning up his rhetoric and accusing Democrats of using troops as pawns in a political battle.

“They’re not chess pieces for Democratic leaders to wield in some partisan game. If Democratic leaders are really this worried about fattening up the IRS or adding a new coat of paint to their congressional offices, we can have that discussion,” McConnell said on Wednesday. “But let’s leave our troops out of it and their families out of it.”

Those comments drew an angry response from Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, who has been publicly pushing McConnell to convene a budget conference to hash out the two parties’ differences. Durbin said he and Democrats are battling the GOP to preserve spending on medical research and other priorities that they accuse Republicans of starving of funds.

“It isn’t because I want a new coat of paint on my office that I’m fighting,” said a steamed Durbin. “I’m fighting for the National Institutes of Health.”