WASHINGTON - Multiple US senators said on Jan 24 they would vote against upcoming government spending Bills after federal agents killed a second American citizen
in Minneapolis, significantly increasing the chances of a government shutdown next week.
Funding for large parts of the federal government, including the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Pentagon, expires on Jan 31.
The Republican-led House of Representatives has passed the funding through September, but it still requires approval in the Senate.
US President Donald Trump’s Republican Party also narrowly controls the 100-member Senate, but does not have enough members to pass spending Bills without Democratic support.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement on Jan 24 that “Senate Democrats will not provide the votes to proceed to the appropriations Bill if the DHS funding Bill is included.”
Republicans had hoped to secure a few Democratic votes on the spending package, despite it including full funding for DHS, the agency carrying out Mr Trump’s controversial immigration agenda.
“I will not support the current Homeland Security funding Bill,” Democratic Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, one of the possible swing voters, said on Jan 24 in a statement after the latest Minneapolis killing.
The Nevada senator said the Trump administration and DHS chief Kristi Noem are “putting undertrained, combative federal agents on the streets with no accountability.”
The killing of Mr Alex Pretti, a 37-year-old Minneapolis nurse, comes just three weeks after another Minnesota resident, 37-year-old Renee Good, was also shot and killed
by a federal agent.
Democratic Senator Mark Warner of Virginia said “this brutal crackdown has to end” in a post on X reacting to Mr Pretti’s death on Jan 24.
“I cannot and will not vote to fund DHS while this administration continues these violent federal takeovers of our cities,” he added.
The longest government shutdown in US history
– in which hundreds of thousands of federal employees are furloughed except those deemed essential and are asked to work without pay – ended last November after 43 days.
Senate rules require 60 votes to pass spending Bills, and the growing number of Democratic lawmakers withdrawing support for the spending Bill made another shutdown just two months after the last one increasingly a possibility. AFP
