Government Shutdown 2013: Pelosi Warns Of 'Strong Negative' Reaction If Republicans Don't Go For Compromise

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said there will be strong opposition if House Republicans don't make their recent concurrent resolution favorable to achieving a compromise.

The House Appropriations Committee introduced a clean continuing resolution earlier this week that didn’t include language to defund Obamacare, the nation’s new health care law. However, House leadership included a concurrent resolution to specifically withhold funding from the health care law. That the main funding bill didn’t include the language wasn’t sufficient for conservative Republicans, who want the defunding language written in.

Republicans and their leadership have returned to the drawing table.

“Clearly, they had to pull their proposal that was supposed to come to the floor this week, which was some combination of defunding or undermining the Affordable Care Act, plus what I find to be is an unacceptable number, inconsistent with the Budget Control Act, which was a bipartisan agreement that they would put forth,” Pelosi said at a news conference on Thursday. “But as bad as all of that was, it wasn’t bad enough for those in the Republican conference so they have to go make matters worse. And when they bring that forward we will see what it is and make a judgment as to how to go forward."

She added, “But I think you will see a strong -- if it looks anything like they were considering now, a strong negative part on the part [sic] of the Democrats. But that doesn’t mean there isn’t a place where we could come together and find common ground. If it gets bad enough that they can get all of their votes, then that is one thing. It doesn’t look like a path to signature though.”

A day after conservative Republicans balked at a continuing resolution proposed by their leadership, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, shunned the idea that his caucus has rejected the proposal.

“Not quite yet,” Boehner said. “There is a lot of discussion going on about how to deal with the [continuing resolution] and the issue of Obamacare. So we’re continuing to work with our members.”

There could be a government shutdown on Oct. 1 if lawmakers don’t pass a continuing resolution, a temporary funding bill, by Sept. 30 when the current bill expires. Quickly behind that is the debt ceiling deadline -- projected to be mid-October -- to extend the nation’s borrowing authority.

“There are all these speculations about these deadlines that are coming up,” Boehner said. “I’m well aware of the deadlines and so are my colleagues. We’re working with our colleagues to work our way through these issues. I think there is a way to get there and I’m going to be continuing to work with my fellow leaders and members to address those concerns.”

The speaker said many options are being discussed by several people.