Even Josh Hawley Has Had Enough of Republicans’ Shutdown Nonsense

While congressional leadership met with President Joe Biden Tuesday ahead of yet another government shutdown deadline, one Senate Republican couldn’t contain his discontent at the stupendous amount of time wasted by his own party on skirting one of Congress’s primary jobs: funding the U.S. government.

“This was supposed to be done in September. I mean this is now almost March? I mean, this is just ridiculous. They have agreement on the [budget] top line. They’ve had it since January,” Hawley told CNN’s Manu Raju.

Apart from the meeting at the White House, practically nothing has changed since Congress passed its last continuing resolution one month ago to extend the shutdown deadline. The new deadline to avoid a partial government shutdown is Friday.

A proper budget is still being held hostage to the aggressive demands of House Republicans, who claim to want more funding for the U.S.-Mexico border, but capitulated earlier this month when that became a possibility, all because President Donald Trump wanted to leverage the issue in the general election.

“This is why I voted against the last [continuing resolution],” Hawley continued. “They’ve just been kicking this can down the road. I can’t believe that they didn’t get work done over the weekend. They’ve had months to do this stuff, I mean my patience has run out.”

“They’re all to blame. And at this point it’s just absurd, I think,” he added, saying that includes Republican leadership but refusing to name names.

Meanwhile, Schumer described the communal meeting with Biden as “productive and intense,” particularly with regard to sending more military aid to Ukraine, which recently surrendered the city of Avdiivka to Russian forces.