We’re a little more than four hours away from the midnight deadline when the federal government runs out of money, and here’s our best understanding of where things stand:
The sense our reporting team on this story has from talking with sources is that there will be some kind of deal struck tonight before the deadline. It’s nothing we can report, but that’s what we’re basing our own editorial decision-making on. So our reporters are staying late on the Hill and at the White House — along with the rest of the DC press corps — to bring you any breaking developments.
In addition to what we’re picking up from sources, there have been some key signals over the course of the afternoon. Republicans are getting drilled on the abortion provisions and are not fighting back on it the way you would normally expect. Perhaps more importantly, at least two key figures from the right wing of the GOP, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) and Mike Huckabee, have publicly given Speaker Boehner the greenlight to cut a deal, even if that means continuing to fund Planned Parenthood. That’s a huge tell.
There’s basically three ways this can come down: a deal tonight, an agreement in principle with details to be finalized over the next few days, or no deal at all and a shutdown.
We’ll be here through the evening until this plays out.
David Kurtz
David Kurtz is Managing Editor and Washington Bureau Chief of Talking Points Memo where he oversees the news operations of TPM and its sister sites.