Vice President JD Vance put the blame on the “far-left faction” of Senate Democrats for the shutdown on Wednesday, crediting moderates who voted with Republicans on a House-passed bill on Tuesday to extend government funding.
“There are critical services that the Democrats have taken hostage because they have a policy disagreement that they are open to work with us on, but they shouldn’t be shutting the government down because of that policy disagreement,” Vance said Wednesday on “CBS Mornings.”
Vance said “we’re going to have to make sure that as much of the peoples’ government remains open or functional as possible.”
“That’s what we’re going to do but there’s going to be some pain,” he added.
On the Affordable Care Act tax credits that Democrats are seeking, Vance said “those subsidies, while many of them are important, they don’t expire until next year.”
“So the idea that you have to shut down the government in early October over subsidies that don’t expire for many months is preposterous, nobody buys it,” he said.
Vance said the administration wants to have the conversation on health care, but “what you don’t do is hold the economy hostage and shut down the government because we’re not giving you everything that you want.”
“What we’ve learned through these cycles of government shutdowns is they never work, they cause a lot of damage,” Vance said. “We should take that wisdom, open up the government, and then talk about how to ensure that people have access to health care.”
The vice president said “each day that we keep going it’s just going to get worse.”
“So let’s stop it,” he said.
