Lawmakers came back from their lengthy August recess this week. They have until the end of the month to fund the government for the next fiscal year and avoid a government shutdown.
But there’s an elephant in the room as negotiations get underway: how do you do the work of legislating when the executive branch refuses to spend federal funds in the way that Congress allocates them? It’s a question that has hung over the 119th Congress since Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency began its rampage through the federal government earlier this year — and one that Democrats will have to contend with as their Republican colleagues repeatedly cede their power of the purse to the Trump White House.