House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., said he's ready to publicly debate Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., as the government remains closed due to a lack of funding and partisan gridlock in Congress.
"I look forward to that," Jeffries told reporters on Tuesday. "We're going to try to get it scheduled, absolutely."
According to The Hill, Johnson had declined an earlier debate challenge from Jeffries, saying the time to debate the Republican-backed stopgap funding bill had passed.
However, during an appearance on C-SPAN last week, the speaker said he would be open to going on the network's new show, "CeaseFire," with Jeffries. The program seeks to bring figures with differing perspectives together to discuss current events.
"I'll sit down with Hakeem Jeffries, my counterpart. I'd love to," Johnson said last Thursday on the network's "Washington Journal." "Sometime we'll get that done."
Jeffries' latest remarks come as the government shutdown that has paralyzed Washington, D.C., enters its third week and both major parties dig into their positions on Capitol Hill with little room for negotiation.
On Sunday, Johnson accused the Democrats of deliberately dragging out the government shutdown for political cover while trying to blame Republicans for the federal closures.
"They are trying their best to distract the American people from the simple fact they've chosen a partisan fight so they can prove to their Marxist-rising base in the Democrat Party that they are willing to fight Trump and Republicans," Johnson said on "Fox News Sunday."
Democrats were furious at the end of last week when Johnson notified the House clerk that he had canceled votes scheduled for this week.
"They decided to shut the government down," Jeffries said on Friday. "Republicans in the House have decided to remain on vacation. Republicans canceled votes last week. They canceled votes this week, and now they've canceled votes for next week. They're not serious."
Meanwhile, Johnson has said he intends to recall House lawmakers back to Washington only after the Senate passes the stopgap spending bill previously passed by the lower chamber to end the shutdown. So far, Democrats have blocked the Senate from reaching the 60 votes needed to pass the measure.
The Hill reported that Jeffries and Democrats have called for new negotiations on a bipartisan spending bill that can pass both chambers of Congress and reopen the government, but Johnson told reporters on Tuesday that he doesn't "have anything to negotiate."
Nicole Weatherholtz ✉
Nicole Weatherholtz, a Newsmax general assignment reporter covers news, politics, and culture. She is a National Newspaper Association award-winning journalist.
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