Former Republican U.S. Senator Pat Toomey spoke with 69 News about the length of the current federal government shutdown.
“It was a little surprising, especially since on the very first votes there were three Democrats that joined with Republicans. Usually if one side is split, that side is going to end up producing the rest of the votes and that is exactly what ended up happening. It just took a lot longer than it usually does,” said Toomey.
The former Senator was at WFMZ for the taping of a Business Matters episode.
He is now in the private sector.
Toomey was in office for the second-longest U.S. government shutdown in history, lasting 35 days.
“There’s always a danger. Part of this is one of the reasons why, so process gets boring, but it’s important and it’s important for Congress to pass the annual appropriation bills that fund the government, broken up into pieces,” said Toomey.
He said different portions like the defense department, legislative branch, judicial branch, roads and transportation.
“You know different portions when they get passed early in the year, the risk comes off the table one after the other until the entire government is funded. That’s actually a good process, it’s just that Congress doesn’t follow it and that’s how we get into this situation,” said Toomey.
Toomey said two-year budgeting may not be the solution to preventing a government shutdown, but could contribute to preventing one in the future.
“The thing I like the idea of have what we call an automatic continuing resolution, so at the end of the year if some portion of the government funding hasn’t been completed, then the government is automatically funded with a continuing resolution that automatically goes with a continuation of last year’s level and that way there’s no shutdown,” said Toomey.