House Freedom Caucus argues Republicans were not aggressive enough

Congress remains at an impasse on how to fund the government just one month away from the deadline to avoid a shutdown ahead of the holidays.

The top Senate and House appropriators discussed on Monday plans to secure government funding by the Dec. 11 deadline, but they emerged from the meeting with no definitive agreement on a path forward.

Democrats and Republicans have been at an impasse since the summer. Democrats would rather pursue short-term funding at current levels until next year, when they will control Congress. But Republicans would prefer to take advantage of their last opportunity in power to fund the Pentagon, among other things.

But fresh off sweeping election wins, Democrats say any government funding bills need to restrict any money going to the Pentagon from being used to support the war in Iran.

“The voters were extremely loud in this election that they want to end the war, they want to put parameters and guardrails around how this administration is doing their funding,” Sen. Patty Murray (Washington), the top Democrat on the Senate Appropriations Committee, said Tuesday.

When asked about Democrats wanting to restrict funding for the Iran war in the appropriations process, House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole (R-Oklahoma) signaled that GOP lawmakers are opposed to that request.

“A Republican Congress is not going to send bills to a Republican president that he’s going to veto,” Cole said.

Cole said that he proposed that Congress pass a series of packages that bundles together a few full-year appropriations bills. Senate Republicans released on Tuesday text for the funding bills related to agriculture and military construction, which could signal where the party wants to start trying to build consensus.