House MAGA Caucus Threatens To Shut Down Government Over Culture Wars

The MAGA House Freedom Caucus, who pushed the United States to the brink of default with their extremist demands just 3 months ago, are back at it again. 

It is time again for Congress to pass a budget bill to fund the government for the next fiscal year which begins on October 1. If a budget is not agreed to by the start of the fiscal year, or a continuing resolution is not passed to continue funding the current budget, the government faces yet another shut down and a threat of default.

If this seems like deja vu all over again, it's because we JUST went through this fight in May over the debt ceiling which was part of a compromise deal to kick the can down the road from the previous year's debt ceiling debate.

At the center of the fight is the House Freedom Caucus, the far-right Trump cult members of the House who are attempting to use the leverage they have over Speaker Kevin McCarthy from his disastrous Speaker election to hold the U.S. economy hostage in order to force a pro-Trump culture war agenda.

The House Freedom Caucus released a statement today saying they would oppose any further funding of the government unless three demands were met: 

1. Include funding for the "Secure the Border Act of 2023" which has passed the House but not the Senate 
2. Address the so-called "weaponization of the justice department"; potentially defunding or even abolishing the FBI
3. And "end the left's woke policies in the Pentagon"

Demands 2 and 3 are so vague it's not entirely clear what laws or actions Congress could take to actually satisfy them, which is obviously the point. "Wokeness" at the Pentagon is a MAGA talking point that has stoked fake outrage about acceptance of trans individuals in the military, and even things as innocuous as military diversity training. 

The statement promised the Caucus would oppose "passage of yet another monstrous, budget busting, pork filled, lobbyist handout omnibus spending bill at year's end..." and that they would "oppose any blank check for Ukraine..."

Here is the statement released by the House Freedom Caucus today:

After the statement was released, House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries posted: “House Republicans are determined to shut down the government and crash our economy. We will fight these MAGA extremists every step of the way."

The stark realities of actually getting these demands met in a continuing resolution are not lost on the members of the MAGA caucus. Here is Republican Rep. Matt Rosedale admitting that members know acceptance of their demands isn't likely:

The real threat in these debates is to Kevin McCarthy, who made a deal with the devil of sorts to secure his position as House Speaker on the 15th ballot by making extraordinary concessions to the MAGA members. Among those was the revival of the "Motion to Vacate" which enables a single member to bring forward a motion to fire McCarthy as Speaker.

The MAGA caucus saw this concession as affirmation of their power over negotiations in the House, emboldening them in the debt ceiling fight. If McCarthy doesn't make at least a concerted effort to include their demands, he could face a right-wing challenge for the gavel. Meanwhile, it's not likely that Democrats will give an inch on these proposals.

Despite the MAGA members of Congress now repeated attempts to destroy the economy to force their phony culture war agenda, it's worth noting that Biden so far has DECREASED the budget deficit, while Trump raised the national debt by almost $8 trillion in 4 years.