Monday, May 18, 2026

Resolution--Shared Sacrifice on Government Shutdowns

Senate votes unanimously to withhold members' pay during future government shutdowns

The United States Senate passed a resolution Thursday by unanimous consent to dock senators' pay during any future government shutdown, a move that came only after two record-setting funding lapses left federal workers scrambling and Americans fuming at a Congress that kept cashing its own checks.

The measure, sponsored by Louisiana Republican Sen. John Kennedy, advanced Wednesday with a 99-0 vote before final adoption the following day. Under the resolution, senators' salaries will be held in escrow whenever a shutdown affects one or more federal agencies. The money gets released only after funding is restored.

It is a narrow fix to a broad problem. But for the first time, senators will face at least a taste of the financial disruption they have inflicted on millions of government employees through repeated failures to fund the agencies they oversee.

Kennedy, speaking on the Senate floor, did not mince words. As the Daily Mail reported, the Louisiana senator laid out the record bluntly:
"We ought to hide our heads in a bag. It's got to stop. Shutting down government, it should not be our default solution to our refusal to work out our issues and our differences."

"This is about shared sacrifice. If senators are going to vote to shut down the government and prevent millions of federal workers from getting paid, they ought to have the same skin in the game."
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It was Democrats who shut down the government twice...Last year, the majority of the federal government was shut down for 43 days. Then, just three months after that crisis ended, the Department of Homeland Security lost its funding for 76 days. Ridiculous.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

That's neither here nor there!

Lynn Anderson said...

Whatever that means as it is relevant to this post...vote to shutdown the government and government workers get no pay then no pay for Congress. Not a hardship for Congress, however, I agree.

Anonymous said...

What is means in this context, is that irrespective of whose fault it was that the government is shut down, neither party should get paid. Assigning blame to whose fault it was should not alter the consequences of their ultimate action. No Work, No Pay!

Anonymous said...

Let's face it our government is broken our elected officials both in the Senate and Congress they are so dysfunctional greedy corrupt and completely do nothing but take money from the good people of this country! We need a better system because the system is broken with almost 40 trillion dollars in debt now how can we ever get out of this hole of hell? It's so sad but it's all the fault of the elected officials they are the worst they're such slaves for Satan they're so evil and greedy and corrupt and dishonest and self-serving! Pray for the United States of America!