SCOTT DETROW, HOST:
The House of Representatives came back for one day this week after being gone for more than 50. During the government shutdown, the House was officially out of session. Some members did town halls back in their districts. Others came to the Capitol anyway. But as NPR's Barbara Sprunt reports, there was angst on all sides when everyone reassembled.
BARBARA SPRUNT, BYLINE: The House Rules Committee met earlier this week ahead of the full House coming back into session on Wednesday. And let's just say things were tense. Here's Jim McGovern, the top Democrat on the panel.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
JIM MCGOVERN: Long time no see. I hardly recognize you guys. Where the hell have you been?
SPRUNT: After repeated comments from Democrats about Republicans being on vacation during the shutdown, Chairwoman Virginia Foxx stepped in.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
VIRGINIA FOXX: I am sick and tired of hearing you all say we had an eight-week vacation.
YASSAMIN ANSARI: That's exactly what happened.
FOXX: I worked every day. I don't know about you.
ANSARI: I worked every single day as well.
FOXX: But I don't want to hear another soul say that.
ANSARI: We all worked every single...
SPRUNT: The House passed its version of a stopgap funding bill in mid-September. House Speaker Mike Johnson then sent lawmakers home. He was asked on the third day of the shutdown, why not stay?
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
MIKE JOHNSON: My quick answer's very simple. The House did its job.
SPRUNT: Then he blamed Democratic leaders in the Senate for not doing theirs. Leadership on both sides of the aisle held press conferences almost every day of the shutdown, but there were no votes, no committee hearings. Wednesday was the first official day back in 54 days.
KEVIN KILEY: It's a lot more crowded here. You know, the halls have been pretty lonely.
SPRUNT: That's California Republican Kevin Kiley. He kept showing up to his Capitol office throughout the shutdown.
KILEY: To be honest with you, this has not been the finest hour for the United States Congress, having the House of Representatives cancel its sessions while so many people across the country were suffering.
SPRUNT: He said he used the time to work with a colleague on the other side of the aisle to address an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire at the end of the year. Those subsidies were central to the shutdown.
KILEY: That was, I guess, one advantage of being here is that we - I have had some constructive conversations like that. But of course, if the entire House was here, then we could have been having this sort of consensus-building process that you need to pass legislation like this.
SPRUNT: Fellow Republican Mark Alford of Missouri said the time back home was useful.
MARK ALFORD: Look, I've been here for three years. I got more done in my district than I think in the three years that I've been there. I've been able to visit farms. We went to businesses. We visited 14 of 18 rural hospitals in our district. And it gave us a real clear picture where America stands right now and what we can do to help.
SPRUNT: Meanwhile, Democrats are still fuming that the House was even sent home at all.
JULIE JOHNSON: This was a ridiculous thing.
SPRUNT: That's Julie Johnson, a freshman Democrat from Texas.
J JOHNSON: I think that the speaker really has exhibited some poor judgment, and it was disrespectful to the body. And then the speaker refusing to swear in a dully elected, that was poor form.
SPRUNT: She's referring to Arizona Democrat Adelita Grijalva, who won a special election in mid-September but wasn't sworn in until yesterday before any votes. The common refrain from Democrats, like New Mexico's Melanie Stansbury, is this.
MELANIE STANSBURY: The House has been completely closed and locked out, and there is all manner of legislative business that could have been going on, and we should have been here the entire time.
SPRUNT: Republican Steve Womack of Arkansas says he agrees with that.
STEVE WOMACK: Listen, I didn't want to go home in August. So to be gone for those five or six weeks and then turn around and do it again in October was just - that's just more than America should have to put up with.
SPRUNT: He's a senior appropriator, and he's now looking down the road at what lies ahead.
WOMACK: We're going to be putting Congress on the clock again in another 78, 79 days. We're going to be right back where we were. I just hope we don't put America back through the same nut roll.
SPRUNT: Funding for much of the government will run out again January 30.
Barbara Sprunt, NPR News, the Capital. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
NPR transcripts are created on a rush deadline by an NPR contractor. This text may not be in its final form and may be updated or revised in the future. Accuracy and availability may vary. The authoritative record of NPR’s programming is the audio record.
