Trump cancels meeting with Democratic leaders, deepening risk of government shutdown as funding deadline looms

By Kit Maher, Ellis Kim, Sarah Ferris, Ted Barrett, Manu Raju, CNN

(CNN) — President Donald Trump scrapped a White House meeting with top congressional Democrats later this week, as the threat of a government shutdown looms over Washington.

“After reviewing the details of the unserious and ridiculous demands being made by the Minority Radical Left Democrats in return for their Votes to keep our thriving Country open, I have decided that no meeting with their Congressional Leaders could possibly be productive,” Trump wrote on his Truth Social platform Tuesday morning.

The president also rattled off a list of demands he claimed Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries want in exchange for their party’s votes to keep the government funded and avert a shutdown on October 1. The pair had confirmed just shortly before that they were scheduled to meet with the president this week in the Oval Office.

While a single meeting between Trump and the Democrats was unlikely to result in a swift deal to avert a shutdown altogether, it had been the most tangible indication yet that party leaders would come to the table to negotiate on funding. Now, with each party publicly trading barbs and refusing to cave, the prospect of a shutdown seems more serious than ever.

Lawmakers left Washington on Friday for a week in their home districts without a path forward, after the Senate rejected both a House-passed seven-week government funding measure and a Democratic alternative.

Republicans have argued their bill to fund the government through November 20 is a “clean” continuing resolution, or CR, with only $30 million in extra security money for members of Congress, $58 million for security for the executive and judicial branch and a funding “fix” for DC to adjust a mistake in an earlier bill.

The Democratic bill, meanwhile, included expensive health care changes, such as extending enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire at the end of the year. Republicans have argued it’s inappropriate to add such provisions to a stopgap funding bill and that they should be negotiated as part of a year-end funding bill.

Meeting pulled after call with top Republicans

Trump’s move to cancel the Thursday meeting came after a conversation with GOP leaders Monday night, where they cautioned against dealmaking with Democrats, according to a person familiar with the discussions.

Trump spoke by phone with House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune about the upcoming funding deadline, shortly after reports surfaced that the president was planning to meet with Schumer and Jeffries.

On the call, the GOP leaders told the president that Schumer was seeking a shutdown brawl with him, and they panned Democrats’ demand to make enhanced Obamacare subsidies permanent as essentially giving free health care to illegal migrants, that person said.

“Thune has been abundantly clear about what he thinks on this issue, and the president is aware of his position,” one source familiar with the discussions told CNN.

Johnson made a similar case against the Affordable Care Act enhanced premium subsidies inside the Capitol last week before lawmakers left town, telling reporters: “We’re not going to pay for health care for illegal aliens, that’s against the law, we’re not doing that.”

Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson told reporters shortly before Trump’s post that he and Senate Majority Leader John Thune would attend any meeting that took place with Democratic leaders, but he questioned whether a meeting was necessary.

“Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries have made just wild partisan demands that they’re trying to attach to a very simple, short term, very clean CR. We just want to keep the government open so our appropriators can continue to do their work,” he told reporters, accusing his Democratic colleagues of “trying to make a mockery of it.”

Democrats accuse Trump of ‘running away’

Ahead of the cancellation, Schumer and Jeffries sought to center their funding demands around health care, much as they have in recent weeks.

They were planning in the meeting, they said, to “emphasize the importance of addressing rising costs, including the Republican healthcare crisis” and argued it was “past time to meet and work to avoid a Republican-caused shutdown.”

But after after it became clear they would not have their anticipated audience with the president, the party leaders struck a much sharper tone.

Jeffries invoked a phrase on X that has been known to irk the president: “Trump Always Chickens Out,” while Schumer – who would have to deliver Republicans seven votes to pass the GOP stopgap measure in the Senate – accused Trump of throwing a tantrum and “running away from the negotiating table before he even gets there.”

Jeffries also told his House members they should return to Washington Monday, even though GOP leaders canceled votes on the eve of the funding deadline.

“Democrats will be in town and prepared to get the job done,” he wrote.

Johnson appeared unlikely to bring members back to Washington early, maintaining that the current plan was to keep lawmakers in their home districts.

“We got our work done in the House. We got it done early with regard to the funding,” he told reporters Tuesday. “People had a lot to do back in their districts, and so we’re on the ready at any time but the plan would be to come back when it’s necessary, but the current plan is to not have session days on September 29 and 30.”

Trump left the door open Tuesday to meeting in the future, provided Democrats “become realistic about the things our Country stands for.” Those talks would be necessary, Jeffries said, if Republicans wanted Democratic votes.

“We have to have a conversation with Donald Trump, or Republican leaders in the Congress, in order to try to find common ground in ways that can prevent a government shutdown if Republicans expect Democratic votes,” Jeffries said during a press conference in Brooklyn.

This story has been updated with additional developments.

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CNN’s Veronica Stracqualursi and Morgan Rimmer contributed to this report.