Senate Passes Resolution to Withhold Lawmakers’ Pay During Future Government Shutdowns

Senators unanimously approved a resolution Thursday to withhold their pay during government shutdowns. The measure, sponsored by Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, a Republican, directs the secretary of the Senate to withhold senators’ pay whenever a government shutdown affects one or more agencies.

Withheld pay would be released once funding is restored. The resolution will take effect the day after the Nov. 3 general election. “Shutting down government should not be our default solution to our refusal to work out our issues and our differences,” Kennedy said in a floor speech Wednesday.

Two shutdowns in the past year created significant financial hardship for tens of thousands of federal workers, particularly at the Department of Homeland Security. The department reopened last month after a 76-day partial shutdown, the longest agency funding lapse in history.

That shutdown came just a few months after a 43-day lapse of the entire federal government, which was the longest such closure on record.

The Constitution stipulates that lawmakers must be paid. Lawmakers have received salaries during shutdowns even as federal workers went without paychecks. When the full government shutdown began in October amid a dispute over health care subsidies, Sen.

Lindsey Graham, a Republican from South Carolina, proposed a constitutional amendment to require members to forfeit their paychecks when the government is closed. “If members of Congress had to forfeit their pay during government shutdowns, there would be fewer shutdowns and they would end quicker,” Graham said at the time.

Kennedy told reporters Wednesday that he pushed his measure to ensure there is “shared sacrifice” during shutdowns.

He added that the resolution does not go as far as he would like but that it’s a start. ” Relations between the Senate and House are “quickly becoming like two kids fighting in the back of a minivan,” Kennedy said. Fortune reported that the bipartisan support for the measure comes at a time when federal closures have become longer and more frequent, frustrating lawmakers who say there should be punishment when Congress fails at its most basic legislative duty.

Graham said his legislation was the most “constitutionally sound” way to deal with the problem, but the process would have been much more laborious as three-fourths of states must ratify an amendment. Lawmakers in previous shutdowns have often pledged to forgo their paychecks while federal workers went unpaid.