Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) said Democrats will not “write a blank check” to the Trump administration to avert a government shutdown.
In a Sunday interview on CNN’s “State of the Union,” the Maryland Democrat doubled down on the party’s opposition to a GOP-backed continuing resolution (CR) to extend government funding at current levels unless money is included for health insurance subsidies under the Affordable Care Act that are set to expire at the end of the year.
“Look, the president wants a blank check. This is a lawless president. He’s been illegally withholding funds. He promised, on day one, he was going to bring down prices. They’ve gone up,” Van Hollen said in the interview. “What we’re saying is that we should turn off this ticking time bomb, which Republicans left in place, that’s going to create a huge spike in health care premiums for about 20 million Americans.”
“Until now, the president has said, nope, he’d rather shut down the government than prevent those health care costs from spiking,” he continued. “I’m glad we’re finally talking. We’ll see what happens.”
Trump is set to meet with the top four leaders in Congress on Monday ahead Tuesday’s shutdown deadline, a notable shift after he canceled a meeting with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) last week.
Van Hollen said he opposes the government shutting down but argued “Donald Trump is the one that has been driving us in that direction, along with Republicans on Capitol Hill who have totally forfeited their constitutional responsibilities to Donald Trump.”
“If you talk to Senate Republicans, they understand that giving the president a blank check to illegally withhold funds — which he’s been doing from day one, much of it with the help of Elon Musk — that that’s the wrong way to go, but they refuse to stand up to him,” Van Hollen said.
“And we’re not going to write a blank check, and we want to prevent these huge spikes in health care costs. That’s what we’re after.”
The White House pushed back on the Maryland Democrat’s remarks, saying the administration “wants a straightforward and clean CR to continue funding the government – the exact same proposal that Democrats supported just 6 months ago, 13 times under the Biden Administration.”
“But radical Democrats are threatening to shut the government down if they don’t get their nearly $1.5 trillion wish list of demands, including free health care for illegal aliens. The Democrat’s radical agenda was rejected by the American people less than a year ago at the ballot box, now they’re trying to shut down the government and hold the American people hostage over it,” White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson added in a statement.
