Recess Over: Sen. Capito gets back to work as government shutdown looms

After spending much of the summer traveling West Virginia, U.S. Sen. Shelley Moore Capito is back on Capitol Hill as Congress returns from recess. But lawmakers have less than three weeks to avoid yet another possible government shutdown ahead of November elections.

Capito, R-W.Va., spoke with reporters Thursday afternoon during a virtual briefing from her offices at the U.S. Capitol Building.

Capito – soon to be West Virginia’s senior U.S. Senator when U.S. Sen. Joe Manchin, I-W.Va., retires at the end of the year – said her recess was spent working in West Virginia, meeting with constituents, and finding out what the needs are before coming back to Washington, D.C., this week.

“It’s been a while since we’ve been here actually in Washington,” Capito said. “I’ve been traveling the state quite a bit…it was a very nice August. It was a good time to reconnect and also to look at some new projects, so I really enjoyed doing that.”

The major issue hanging over Congress is a possible shutdown of the federal government on Monday, Sept. 30, if Republican and Democratic lawmakers can’t agree on a continuing resolution to keep the government funded through March 2025. That effort is being led by the slim Republican majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“Government spending usually has to begin in the House,” said Capito, a former member of the House herself. “We’ve been waiting to see what Speaker (Mike) Johnson can pull through in the House.”

Johnson, R-La., pulled a continuing resolution bill off the House agenda earlier this week due to bipartisan pushback. Johnson has planned to link the bill to another bill – the SAVE Act – that would target illegal voting by undocumented immigrants – something that is already illegal. The bill would require proof of citizenship in order to register to vote. But the Democratic majority in the U.S. Senate have said a continuing resolution with the SAVE Act attached would be dead on arrival.

“Democrats support a CR to keep the government open,” said Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., in a dear colleague letter last week. “As I have said before, the only way to get things done is in a bipartisan way. Despite Republican bluster, that is how we’ve handled every funding bill in the past, and this time should be no exception. We will not let poison pills or Republican extremism put funding for critical programs at risk.”

Capito said she was fine with the inclusion of the SAVE Act on the continuing resolution, but acknowledged that Senate Democrats would not provide their support as long as those two proposals were linked.

“I kind of already thought that we were doing that, that you had to have a proof of citizenship to vote in this country, but apparently you don’t have to have that proof,” Capito said. “So, I’m in favor of the SAVE Act. I do think that because that’s attached to the continuing resolution in the House, it’s met with opposition from one side or the other.”

Adding the SAVE Act to the continuing resolution was seen as a way to get reluctant House Republicans to support the continuing resolution, but Johnson pulled the bill from the agenda Wednesday after members of his GOP caucus continued to raise issues with the continuing resolution. But Capito said she thinks both parties and both chambers can come to an agreement on a short-term continuing resolution before the Sept. 30 deadline.

“There some Republicans apparently can’t accept it, so we’re going to have to wait and see what the House does,” Capito said. “Shutdowns are a road to nowhere…they are hurtful and they don’t achieve any political gain. No, we’re not going to go into the election with a shutdown.

“What I think will probably happen is that we will come around in the next two weeks and do what’s called a skinny CR, which means we’ll just hit the high points that we need to hit and then push the really difficult and heavy lifting until December,” Capito continued.

Capito – a minority member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, criticized Schumer and congressional Democrats for holding up major appropriations bills. Senate committees have approved multiple appropriations bills in July and August, but none of the bills have come before the full Senate for a vote.

“We’ve passed 11 of the 12 bills out of our appropriations committee, but Chuck Schumer – for all his wisdom – has decided not to put these bills up for consideration on the full Senate floor, which I think is short-circuiting the process,” Capito said. “It’s leading us to a lot of uncertainty, and that’s where you hear a lot of talk about a continuing resolution, which would continue our spending.”