Lawmakers Point Fingers Over Budget Deadlock

With eight days left to avert a possible government shutdown, Congressional leaders from both parties on Sunday passed around blame and resorted to name calling, but offered no clear path to a compromise that would allow for continued financing of government operations.

In television appearances, Republicans and Democrats accused each other of being responsible for the impasse. On the CNN program “State of the Union,” Representative Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic leader of the House, called her opponents “legislative arsonists.”

“They’re there to burn down what we should be building up in terms of investments in education and scientific research and all that it is that make our country great and competitive,” she said.

Senator Ted Cruz, the Texas Republican, said that Democrats in the Senate would probably use “brute political power,” by trying to invoke a simple majority vote that would not rely on Republican votes, to block a bill passed by House Republicans last week that linked financing for the government to the elimination of financing for President Obama’s health care law, which is about to go into full effect.

Senate Democratic leaders are likely to respond to the House bill in the coming days by stripping out the health care provision and sending it back to the House, where Republicans will have little time to respond before the Oct. 1 deadline. Complicating matters further, Congressional Republicans have threatened to refuse to raise the government’s borrowing limit later next month, meaning the country could default on some of its debt.

Mr. Obama said last week that such a scenario would be “profoundly destructive,” and warned that if it happened “America becomes a deadbeat.”

Mr. Cruz on Sunday called on Republicans in the House and Senate to unite around the repeal of money for the health care law, which both sides often call Obamacare. Should a government shutdown occur, he said, it would be the fault of Mr. Obama and Senate Democrats, who have refused to negotiate over the health care law.

“We’ve been standing up, leading the fight to defund Obamacare,” Mr. Cruz said, adding later, “I believe we should stand our ground.”

Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, accused Mr. Cruz and Republican leaders of refusing to accept Mr. Obama’s re-election last November, which she described as in part a referendum on Mr. Obama’s health care law.

“I don’t think in America we should throw tantrums when we lose elections and threaten to shut down the government and refuse to pay the bills,” Ms. McCaskill said on “Fox News Sunday.” “The American people had a choice last November. They had a choice between someone who said, ‘repeal Obamacare,’ and President Obama.”