WASHINGTON, DC – While still in her Washington, D.C., office, North Dakota Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak is speaking about work done by her and her Republican colleagues in an attempt to avoid the current partial government shutdown.
“Me and all my colleagues did our work 11 days ago and brought forward a clean, nonpartisan straightforward solution to all this,” she told The Flag’s Scott Hennen. “A short-term continuation of existing funding levels, which they’ve supported multiple times and, in many cases, set the funding levels that they’re now refusing to extend.”
Fedorchak said Republicans agreed to short-term continuations a total of 13 times during the Biden administration – a temporary stopgap measure.
Congresswoman Julie Fedorchak on The Flag’s What’s On Your Mind
“Give us time to work on completing the budget in regular order, as it should be done, and work on bipartisan policy solutions to the issues that they’re talking about in terms of healthcare,” she said, adding completion of the farm bill. “This is all in their hands. I’m shocked and disappointed. I’m really frustrated because this should not be a partisan exercise.”
Fedorchak spoke strongly about the Democrats.
“They are having a hissy fit and they caused it,” she said. “They caused this, this is chaos of their own making.”
While not everything is shut down, ‘it’s scaled back in many ways.’
“What I really dislike about it is people are furloughed,” Fedorchak said. “It’s great uncertainly for our military.”
Reflecting on a recent visit to Grand Forks, Fedorchak said she spoke with the Colonel in charge of the Grand Forks Air Force Base.
“The last thing that the Colonel In charge of the base up there told me was, ‘Please know that government shutdowns are really painful for the military and difficult. And do everything you can to avoid it,’” she said. “And I said, ‘Absolutely..’”
Fedorchak said the Republicans have ‘provided a clean, nonpartisan solution to extend funding temporarily’ so the work can be completed.
“I really believed that the Democrats would see the light and support it,” she said. “I’m super disappointed that they didn’t.”
The last government shutdown happened during President Trump’s first term in 2018 and lasted 35 days.
