Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., is sending a pointed signal to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., as the 2025 government shutdown is poised to enter a second week.

The leader of the House of Representatives canceled chamber activities for next week, effectively directing lawmakers to remain in their home districts until at least Oct. 14.

Johnson appears to be raising the stakes on Senate Democrats, who keep refusing the GOP’s plan to fund government agencies on a short-term basis in favor of making demands on healthcare that Republicans are calling unreasonable.

Originally, the House had been slated to return to a regular legislative schedule on Oct. 7. The full House was last in session on Sept. 19.

Johnson warned earlier on Friday that the House may not return until Schumer and Democrats agreed with Republicans’ bill.

‘We passed it, and it’s been rejected by the Senate,’ the House speaker told reporters during a news conference. ‘So the House will come back into session and do its work as soon as Chuck Schumer allows us to reopen the government. That’s plain and simple.’

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., told Fox News Digital during his own Friday news conference that he would summon his Democratic caucus back into D.C. next week whether Republicans were there or not.

Meanwhile, two sources told Fox News Digital earlier on Friday that it was one of several strategies that House GOP leaders were considering, but were waiting to see how the Senate’s Friday afternoon vote played out.

It was the fourth time Senate Democrats rejected the GOP’s funding plan, a mostly flat extension of fiscal year (FY) 2025 government funding levels. The measure, called a continuing resolution (CR), would also include $88 million in security funding for lawmakers, the White House and the judicial branch — which has bipartisan support.

But Democrats in the House and Senate were infuriated by being sidelined in federal funding talks. 

They have been pushing for an extension of Obamacare subsidies enhanced during the COVID-19 pandemic. Those enhancements would expire by the end of 2025 without congressional action.

Democrats have also introduced a counter-proposal for a CR that would keep the government funded through Oct. 31 while reversing the GOP’s cuts to Medicaid made in their ‘One Big, Beautiful Bill.’

The counter-proposal would have also restored federal funding to NPR and PBS that was cut by the Trump administration earlier this year.

Republicans have panned that plan as a non-starter full of partisan demands, while pointing out that Democrats have voted for a ‘clean’ measure similar to the GOP proposal 13 times during former President Joe Biden’s time in office.

Canceling next week’s House votes also puts off the probability that lawmakers would have to vote on making the Department of Justice release even more files related to Jeffrey Epstein.

Reps. Thomas Massie, R-Ky., and Ro Khanna, D-Calif., needed just one more person to sign onto a petition aimed at forcing a vote on the Epstein files — a signature they would have gotten if Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva, D-Ariz., was sworn in next week following her special election victory.

House GOP leaders have panned that petition as unserious and superfluous, having already directed the House Oversight Committee to investigate the DOJ’s handling of Epstein’s case.

Johnson told Fox News Digital earlier this week that he was concerned the bipartisan measure was written in a way that it would not protect sensitive information regarding Epstein’s victims.

When asked about Johnson’s move during his own Friday news conference, Schumer told reporters, ‘Johnson and the House Republicans care more about protecting the Epstein files than protecting the American people.’

President Donald Trump signed an order Monday offering a U.S. guarantee for Qatar’s security, a significant commitment for the rising non-NATO Arab ally.

‘The United States shall regard any armed attack on the territory, sovereignty, or critical infrastructure of the State of Qatar as a threat to the peace and security of the United States,’ the order, made public Wednesday, read in no uncertain terms.

‘In the event of such an attack, the United States shall take all lawful and appropriate measures — including diplomatic, economic, and, if necessary, military — to defend the interests of the United States and of the State of Qatar and to restore peace and stability.’

The guarantee represented a level of support typically offered to Washington’s closest allies. It came after Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu apologized to Qatari Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani for a Sept. 9 Israeli strike on his territory. 

The strike was targeted at Hamas but killed one Qatari security official in the process.

Qatar also was attacked by Iran in June in a strike targeted at its U.S. base.

The order falls short of a NATO-style defense pact — it hasn’t been ratified by the Senate, so it isn’t binding.

It came as Netanyahu and Trump, during a visit to the White House Monday, announced a 20-point plan to end the war in Gaza, brokered with Qatari mediation. Hamas has not yet accepted the plan.

U.S. relations with Doha have come a long way since 2017, when Trump accused Qatar of harboring terrorism: ‘The nation of Qatar, unfortunately, has historically been a funder of terrorism at a very high level,’ Trump said at the time.

From there, Qatar became a major non-NATO ally to the U.S. in 2022 under President Biden and is home to Al Udeid Air Base, one of the U.S.’ largest Middle East bases and a key hub for U.S. Central Command operations.

The nation is now gifting the U.S. with a new plane to serve as Air Force One.

Qatar welcomed the president’s executive order in a statement saying it reflects ‘the strong and longstanding ties between Doha and Washington.’

‘Qatar remains committed to working with the United States and international partners as a trusted mediator to address shared challenges, advance conflict resolution through diplomatic means, and support sustainable peace in the region,’ the statement said.

A security guarantee has long been a goal for Qatar and other Gulf allies like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

The nation has hosted a Hamas political office since 2012, but local officials say they were asked to do so by the U.S. to establish a line of communication for negotiations.

Before Qatar was involved in mediating the Gaza ceasefire, it was a bridge for U.S. and Taliban talks before the withdrawal in 2021 and has worked on prisoner exchanges between Russia and Ukraine. This year it’s been involved with the U.S. in working out a peace agreement between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, signed at the White House in June.

Senate Democrats blocked Republicans’ attempt to reopen the government again, all but guaranteeing that the government shutdown rolls through the weekend.

After a day off to observe Yom Kippur, lawmakers made little progress in finding an off-ramp to end the shutdown, which entered its third day on Friday. And as the government remains closed, both sides appear to be digging further into their positions.

Senate Republicans’ attempt to reopen the government failed on a largely party-line 54-44 vote for a fourth time, with the same trio of Senate Democratic caucus members — Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa.; Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev.; and Angus King, I-Maine — joining most Republicans in backing the bill.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., plans to bring the bill to the floor again and again in a bid to chip away at Democrats’ largely unified front. He lamented the work that could be happening, like advancing spending bills and negotiating other bipartisan priorities, on the Senate floor rather than repeating the same exercise of trying to reopen the government. 

‘They have taken hostage the federal government and, by extension, the American people, who are the only losers in this,’ Thune said. ‘Everybody’s talking about who wins and who loses and who gets the blame. That’s not what this is about. This is about doing what’s in the best interest of the American people. And what’s in the best interest of the American people is keeping the government open and operating so it can continue to work on their behalf.’ 

Senate Democrats, led by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., demand that they get a seat at the table to negotiate a bipartisan continuing resolution (CR).

Their main rallying cry has been pushing for an extension to expiring Obamacare tax credits, which Senate Republicans have said they would consider only after the government is reopened. While the credits don’t expire until the end of the year, Democrats argue that if Congress doesn’t act now, people who use Obamacare will see their healthcare premiums skyrocket.

‘We know Americans want this, and we know many of my Republican colleagues want this as well,’ Schumer said. ‘But failure to act would be devastating. And Republicans know it. Even Donald Trump knows it. He talked about it a little bit with us in the White House.’

When asked if the pressure would mount to a point where Democrats cave, Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., told Fox News Digital, ‘We’re on the right side of history right now.’

Republicans largely agree it is an issue that should be dealt with, but they also want reforms in the program rather than the blanket, permanent extension that Democrats suggested in their counter-proposal.

Some Democrats also view the shutdown as a way to stand up to President Donald Trump.

‘The truth is, we shut down the government because Republicans wouldn’t negotiate, because Donald Trump wants to shut down,’ Sen. Chris Murphy, D-Conn., said. ‘He’s just bragging in the Oval Office about how good a shutdown will be for him. And we’re going to talk about the consequences of Republicans continuing to push these giant healthcare increases on people and the consequences of a lawless president.’

The administration is not resting on its laurels either and has targeted funding in blue cities and states, along with threats of mass firings beyond the typical furloughs of nonessential federal employees to get congressional Democrats to blink.

Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought announced Friday that $2.8 billion in Chicago infrastructure project funding would be put on hold to prevent ‘race-based contracting,’ a move that came on the heels of $18 billion in infrastructure money in New York City and $8 billion in ‘Green New Scam’ funding from going to 16 blue states being withheld earlier this week.

Thune argued that the administration is what Democrats ‘have wrought’ by continuing to withhold their votes. 

‘They are allowing the administration to do the very thing that, back in March, they said they didn’t want to give them the authority to do,’ he said. ‘And that’s to make decisions just like that. But that’s what’s going to happen.’ 

Meanwhile, bipartisan talks are brewing in the background, though no real deal nor compromise has materialized.

There have been suggestions of extending the credits for another year after the government is reopened or doing a shorter CR to match up with the beginning of open enrollment on Nov. 1. But Republicans engaged in talks are more keen to keep the government open until at least Nov. 21 to allow appropriators to finish their work on spending bills.

‘Nobody’s married to any of this, but we’ve got to get the 45 days in effect first,’ Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said. 

Top Republican officials appear to be at odds with each other over how to portray the fallout from the ongoing government shutdown.

Senate Democrats are still refusing to budge from their demands for Obamacare subsidy extensions to be included in a short-term federal funding bill, so it is likely the government will stay shut down at least until next week.

It has given President Donald Trump and the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) wide discretion over what agencies and project operations will look like, as well as the federal workforce.

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., has sought to portray those decisions as difficult tasks for Trump and OMB Director Russ Vought, particularly the administration’s push to permanently lay off federal workers the longer the shutdown goes on.

Johnson told Fox News Digital in an interview earlier this week that Trump is ‘very bothered’ by the position Democrats have put the government in and is concerned about its lasting impact on Americans. 

He also told Fox Business host Larry Kudlow on Thursday that Vought is in an ‘unenviable’ position, and while there ‘could be some good that comes out of it, if we limit the size and scope of government’ that ‘it is not a job that he relishes.’

And while Trump has heaped blame on Democrats for the shutdown’s impact on Americans, he’s struck a different tone when discussing its political fallout in recent days.

Trump posted on Truth Social Thursday that he would meet with Vought ‘to determine which of the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, he recommends to be cut.’

‘I can’t believe the Radical Left Democrats gave me this unprecedented opportunity,’ Trump continued. ‘They are not stupid people, so maybe this is their way of wanting to, quietly and quickly, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!’

Johnson also gave an emphatic defense of Vought during House Republicans’ lawmaker-only call with the OMB director Wednesday, Fox News Digital was told.

The speaker cast the impending federal layoffs as a difficult position for Vought to be in, and one that Democrats placed him in by refusing the GOP’s funding plan.

‘Russ is not the grim reaper,’ Johnson said, Fox News Digital was told.

On Thursday evening, however, Trump shared an AI-generated video on Truth Social featuring Vought as a grim reaper-like character set against a parody version of Blue Oyster Cult’s song ‘Don’t Fear the Reaper.’

The video showed Vought walking through an office full of workers and through a hall of portraits featuring top Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y.

‘Russ Vought is the reaper. He wields the pen, the funds and the brain,’ the voiceover sings. ‘Dems, you babies, here comes the reaper.’

Johnson broached the different signals during a press conference on Friday, telling reporters that Trump does not take ‘great pleasure’ in the shutdown’s disruptions but is ‘trolling the Democrats,’ because ‘that’s what President Trump does.’

Asked to square those two points, Johnson said the mockery was exclusively aimed at Democrats.

‘The effects are very serious on real people, real Americans. We support federal employees who do a great job in all these different areas. But what they’re having, trying to have fun with, trying to make light of, is to point out the absurdity of the Democrats’ position,’ Johnson said.

‘They’re using memes and all the tools of social media to do that. Some people find that entertaining. But at the end of the day, the decisions are hard ones. And I’m telling you, they’re not taking any pleasure in that.’

While Trump’s messaging can appear to undercut that of House GOP leaders’, it could also be a strategy to squeeze Democrats on two separate planes as they continue to resist Republicans’ federal funding strategy.

Republicans are pushing a relatively flat extension of fiscal year (FY) 2025 federal funding levels through Nov. 21 in order to give lawmakers more time to hash out a longer-term deal for FY 2026.

They’ve pointed out that it’s a similar measure to what Democrats have approved 13 separate times under former President Joe Biden.

But Democrats, infuriated by being sidelined in the federal funding discussions, are withholding support unless Republicans include language extending Obamacare subsidies that were temporarily enhanced during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Republican leaders have signaled openness to discussing the credits, which expire at the end of 2025 without congressional action, but have said those talks are better kept separate from federal funding.

The White House did not immediately respond when reached for comment on Trump and Johnson’s messaging, but Fox News Digital did receive an automated reply that stated, ‘Due to staff shortages resulting from the Democrat Shutdown, the typical 24/7 monitoring of this press inbox may experience delays. We ask for your patience as our staff work to field your requests in a timely manner.’

‘As you await a response, please remember this could have been avoided if the Democrats voted for the clean Continuing Resolution to keep the government open. The press office also cannot accommodate waves requests or escorts at this time. Thank you for your attention to this matter,’ the message said.

White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt was pressed about President Donald Trump seemingly changing his campaign position on Project 2025 amid the government shutdown Friday.

‘During the campaign, President Trump said that he did not know anything about Project 2025. Now, he knows about it. Is that the blueprint for shrinking the government?’ Fox News senior White House correspondent Peter Doocy asked Leavitt during the press briefing Friday afternoon. 

Project 2025 is a roughly thousand-page policy proposal crafted by the conservative Heritage Foundation think tank during the 2024 election cycle. 

Leavitt made no mention of the policy proposal in her response, arguing any decisions on layoffs of federal government employees or cuts to federal programs are up to what the ‘president and his team and his Cabinet secretaries ultimately decide.’ 

‘And the president trusts his Cabinet secretaries to identify where there is waste, fraud and abuse. We pointed out this morning — or Russ Vought tweeted about this morning — a Chicago rail project that was canceled,’ Leavitt said. ‘We paused $2.1 billion in Chicago infrastructure projects, specifically the Red line extension and the Red and Purple modernization projects, and it’s because the administration is concerned that the Biden administration was handing out taxpayer dollars to pay for this construction based on DEI.’ 

The Department of Transportation ‘is reviewing the race-based contracting on unconstitutional grounds,’ she said. ‘And in the meantime, the Department of Transportation funds for these projects are on hold. So I guess this answers both of your questions. This would be an example of that.’

Project 2025 became a lightening rod of criticism among Democrats during the 2024 election, as the Harris–Walz campaign claimed it was rife with ‘dangerous’ policies stretching from abortion to the economy. 

Trump denied knowing details about the policy blueprint from the campaign trail. 

‘I know nothing about Project 2025,’ Trump said in July 2024. ‘I have no idea who is behind it. I disagree with some of the things they’re saying and some of the things they’re saying are absolutely ridiculous and abysmal. Anything they do, I wish them luck, but I have nothing to do with them.’

On Thursday, after the government shutdown, Trump posted to Truth Social that he was set to meet with Office of Management and Budget (OMB) chief Russell Vought, describing him as the man of ‘PROJECT 2025 Fame.’ 

Vought was one of the architects behind the Project 2025 policy proposal. 

‘I have a meeting today with Russ Vought, he of PROJECT 2025 Fame, to determine which of the many Democrat Agencies, most of which are a political SCAM, he recommends to be cut, and whether or not those cuts will be temporary or permanent,’ Trump posted on Thursday, setting of renwewd criticsms of Project 2025. 

Leavitt’s comments come as Trump and OMB map out a plan to roll out layoffs and cut government programs amid the government shutdown. 

A Senate Republican has a list of more than a ‘trillion dollars worth of ideas ripe for a trim’ as the federal government shutdown continues. 

Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought has so far announced his plans to withhold nearly $30 billion in federal funding to blue states and cities, while Senate Democrats continue to block Republicans’ efforts to reopen the government.

And Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, has some ideas for even deeper cuts. In a letter to Vought, first obtained by Fox News Digital, Ernst laid out a plan that could result in over $2 trillion in cuts to federal spending.

Her letter comes as Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and most Senate Democrats have remained steadfast in their opposition to the GOP’s short-term funding extension.

‘Schumer’s Shutdown has provided a golden opportunity to slash waste, fraud and abuse in Washington,’ Ernst said in a statement to Fox News Digital. ‘There is no one more fitting to lead the charge than Russ Vought.’

‘I have compiled a comprehensive list of more than $2 trillion of nonessential government expenditures that should be put on the chopping block to put taxpayers first, make Washington squeal and deliver a more efficient government,’ she continued.

Ernst, who chairs the Senate DOGE Caucus, which borrowed its moniker from tech billionaire Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), wants to target tens of billions in expired and unexpired COVID-19 pandemic funding, consolidate unused federal office space and prevent taxpayers from ‘subsidizing’ the roughly $400 million per day in backpay owed to furloughed nonessential federal workers.

She also wants to go after nearly $1.6 trillion in unspent funding ‘stashed away in secret slush funds,’ clawback billions in the Biden-era electric vehicle charging station program, railroad projects in blue states, end research into ‘silly science projects’ like shrimp on treadmills, and streamline ‘duplication and unnecessary overlap within’ the Department of War, among many others.

‘This is by no means an exhaustive list, and I will be providing many more recommendations soon,’ Ernst wrote in the letter. ‘My team and I stand ready to help you make some prime cuts during this Schumer Shutdown.’

Meanwhile, there appeared to be no off-ramp in sight to end the now three-day government shutdown.

Senate Democrats are also unfazed by Vought and President Donald Trump’s desire to target their states and cities with cuts, with many arguing that the administration was already carrying out those tactics.

Still, Senate Republicans hope that enough Democrats peel off and vote to reopen the government. So far, three members of the Democratic caucus have done so — Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., and Angus King, I-Maine.