House Speaker Mike Johnson on government shutdown

WASHINGTON (CBS, KYMA) - House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) with Margaret Brennan on Face the Nation Sunday about the government shutdown.

When asked if anyone is at Capitol Hill to negotiate with, Speaker Johnson said, "There is not...It's kind of quiet around here. It has been for the last several days."

"I pray that more Democrats in the Senate will come to their senses and do the right thing, and when they have the next opportunity on Monday to vote to open the government, I surely hope that they will," Johnson added.

According to Brennan, federal workers, including the military, would miss their first paychecks by October 15 or 16, prompting her to ask Johnson how long should they plan to be without income, and he said:

"The only person who can answer that question is your next guest and that's Chuck Schumer, because the House did its job. The reason that House Republicans are home working in their districts, and I suspect House Democrats should be as well, is because we did that. We passed a bipartisan, very clean continuing resolution a couple of weeks back now, and sent it to the Senate. It's very important to note what was in that. It was only 24 pages in length...It was a good faith effort to keep the government open for seven more weeks so that Republicans and Democrats, in a bipartisan fashion, could work together to fund the government with the appropriations process. Chuck Schumer always voted for those in the past. In fact, he did it 13 times during the four years of the Biden administration, but now suddenly he's commanding his Democrats in the Senate not to do it, and there's one simple reason why. They need political cover from the far left corner of the base. He's afraid, Chuck Schumer, individually...ask him about it. He's afraid he's going to get a challenge from the Marxist left in his party, because that's the new wave in New York. That's what this is about. Chuck Schumer is trying to show a fight against the President and Republicans and real Americans are being harmed in the process of this political game."

According to Brennan, Democrats want to have another conversation about extending some "tax subsidies that lower the cost of some health care that's purchased through the Obamacare market" as it'll expire by the end of the year.

Meanwhile, Jen Kiggans, Johnson's fellow Republican, said, "Raising costs for families with little notice and potentially stripping them of access to care is simply unacceptable."

When asked if Kiggans has a point, Johnson said:

"There's a lot of points to be made on that, and we're ready to talk about, negotiate and do all of that, but they're trying to create that as a red herring here right now...This is a funding bootstrap measure, a very simple, very conventional thing that's been done here all the time. This is the way it works now. We need a little more time on the clock to finish the appropriations process. We have plenty of time to debate that very complicated issue. It's not a simple one. There has to be reforms to that subsidy, because there's a lot of fraud, waste and abuse involved in it. There's 535 members of Congress in the House and Senate. There's probably 400 different ideas on how to fix that, so we need a little time to do it. We're not saying that we won't negotiate it. We're saying turn the lights back on in Congress. Get troops paid TSA agents and border patrol agents paid who are trying to protect us. Restore the health care programs that are being stalled for veterans and Medicare recipients who are getting home health, it's all stalled now, restore FEMA flood insurance programs in the middle of hurricane [season]."

During the interview, Brennan said the Kaiser Family Foundation "reported 80% of all premium tax credits went to Obamacare enrollees" in red states, leading her to ask Johnson if he is at all worried if wanting to talk about the tax credit could hurt him and his voters, to which he said:

"No, because we have time to do it again. The funding doesn't run out until December 31st. We're talking about a September 30th deadline that's now passed to keep the government open so that Republicans and Democrats can have that very debate. Chuck Schumer has shut it off because he needs a political argument right now. 100% that's what this is about. Play the tape. Play the tape of Chuck Schumer saying consistently for the last 30 years that CRs are dangerous, destructive, and selfish. He is now the captain of it, and it's on him. Republicans in the House, Senate, and the White House want to keep the government open, and we have voted to do so."

To watch more of Brennan's interview with Johnson, click here.