Government Shut down looms in DC The Senate and House temporarily paused the government shut-down standoff with each other by both bodies going into recess for the weekend. However, before the Senate recessed on Friday, they teed up a procedural vote for Monday, Sept. 26 at 5:30PM. This Monday vote will represent whether or not the democrats in the Senate can win the tug-of-war that is taking place between the House and Senate over FEMA (Federal Emergency management) funding that is included in the continuing resolution. This familiar political war isn’t about a funding level, but rather about whether part of the funding level should be offset or not. The underlying bill is the continuing resolution or commonly known as the CR, which continues funding for a federal government until Nov. 18. The House is in a wait and see mode that could ultimately lead to Congress shutting down the federal government effective close of business on Friday, Sept. 30. This shut-down is the result of Congress’ lack of ability to pass appropriations bills that fund all of the agencies of our Federal government.  The House of Representatives was more than half way through passing the 12 individual appropriations bills that fully fund our government when they had to stop and began to negotiate with the Senate on the amount of government funding that would be contained in a continuing resolution. This stop gap measure not only funds our government through Nov. 18 but also funds the federal emergency management agency. Our FEMA has been running on fumes for several weeks due to 42 states needing federal aid for various natural disasters that have occurred across our country during this past year. Earlier last week, the House passed the CR with $3.6B in FEMA funding with a small pay-for or offset coming out of the Energy department’s loan guarantee program. This energy loan program is one that targets “green automobile technology.”  While the two bodies of our Congress have agreed to the overall level of funding for our federal agencies, they are at odds over the FEMA funding. The House wants to fund FEMA with a budget of about $3.6B and the Senate originally wanted upwards of $6 B for FEMA.  Earlier in the week, the Speaker of the House was blindsided a bit when he called up the CR with the FEMA funding, partially offset, and watched the funding bill fail Wednesday night by a vote of 195 to 230.  By the close of business last week, the House had re- passed the CR that funded FEMA to the tune of $3.6B and included a higher offset from DOE loan guarantee programs. The Senate democrats then quickly defeated that proposal and instead replaced it with the same level of FEMA funding, but they dropped any offsets to pay the bill for FEMA. This is the procedural vote that will occur on Monday at 5:30 in the US Senate. If 60 Senators vote affirmatively on Monday, then the new CR, minus the House FEMA offset, heads back to the House where they will have to take some action or the federal government will run out of money by the end of the week.  One democratic member of Congress was quoted on the Senate floor as stating that FEMA funds haven’t been paid for or offset for over 30 years………….why start now? HUM, Congress has been enacting global budget and debt deals for over 30 years too and that hasn’t worked out too well for us.  Stay tuned to see how this game of chicken plays out in DC this week.   Elizabeth B. Letchworth is a retired, elected United States Senate secretary for the majority and minority. Currently she is a senior legislative adviser for Covington & Burling, LLC and is the founder of GradeGov.com