WASHINGTON (Reuters) – With time running out, an ideological fight in the US Congress over abortion and environmental issues threatened yesterday to derail an agreement to avert a government shutdown.
The mood swung between optimism and pessimism through the day as Democratic and Republican leaders held a whirlwind series of private meetings and public news conferences to plead their case for a budget deal that would keep the government operating beyond midnight tonight.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Democrat, and House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, a Republican, met for more than an hour with President Barack Obama and will return to the White House at 7 pm EDT (2300 GMT).
“I’m not very optimistic,” Reid told reporters before the evening meeting, blaming the impasse on a Republican push for policy provisions that could block public funding of birth control and stymie environmental protection efforts.
Boehner said there were a number of issues remaining on the table “and any attempt to try to narrow this down to one or two just would not be accurate.”
House Republicans approved a stop-gap bill to push the deadline back a week that includes $12 billion in additional spending cuts and assures Pentagon funding through Sept. 30.
Reid called the short-term extension a “non-starter” in the Senate because of the spending cuts, and Obama vowed to veto it.
