A bipartisan deal to avoid a government shutdown collapsed Wednesday amid an ongoing campaign against the package led by billionaire Elon Musk — an agreement that included a series of false and misleading statements.
Musk used his social network could pass in time to avert a government. closure that was scheduled to begin at 12:01 a.m. Saturday.
That outcome seemed more likely when President-elect Donald Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance came out against the bill and instead called for a relaxed measure along with an increase in the debt limit. The House canceled votes on the spending plan, which included $100 billion in disaster relief, billions in agricultural aid and dozens of other side deals that pushed the final product past 1,500 pages.
Among the more than 100 tweets Musk sent as part of his campaign were a number of misleading or outright false claims — a possible harbinger of the mogul’s new role as co-leader of a Trump-blessed effort to cut government funding.
For example, Musk has repeatedly posted on X that a government shutdown would have no significant impact on the country. He replied “YES” to a message that read: “Just close the government until January 20th. Pay it all off. We have been doing well for 33 days.” Another message from Musk said a shutdown “does not actually shut down critical functions.”
But while essential functions would continue during a shutdown, in practice there are significant consequences: other government employees will stop their daily work and miss out on wages. While social security checks will be carried out and the mail will be delivered, agency closures are causing a huge loss of productivity. A five-week shutdown between 2018 and 2019 caused the economy to lose about $3 billion, according to estimates from the Congressional Budget Office.
The billionaire also falsely claimed that members of Congress would get a 40 percent pay raise as part of the package — something both Musk and the X account for his so-called Department of Government Efficiency got wrong.
Members of Congress haven’t had a $174,000 raise since 2009, after repeatedly freezing a law that would implement automatic cost-of-living increases. The upcoming CR does not include a COLA freeze, but that wouldn’t result in a 40 percent wage increase – far from it. The maximum potential wage adjustment would be 3.8 percent, an increase of $6,600.
Even if lawmakers had given themselves all 15 years of rejected COLAs—which, again, they don’t—this would result in an increase of only 31 percent, according to the Congressional Research Service.
Musk again claimed that the bill would provide $3 billion for a new NFL stadium in Washington. False: The bill transfers control of the site of the existing RFK Stadium to DC’s local government for redevelopment, which could potentially include a stadium. No federal funds change hands as part of the transaction.
There’s a possibility that D.C. taxpayers will eventually buy into the project: Mayor Muriel Bowser has used local funding to cover the costs of environmental cleanup and upgrades to the underlying infrastructure. But any redevelopment plan would be subject to D.C. government approval and would not involve any federal dollars appropriated in the pending bill.
He is also wrong to say the bill protects the Jan. 6 committee — a claim that Trump may have drawn further into the debate.
Musk said it was “[o]outrageous” that the bill would prevent Republicans in the House of Representatives from investigating the select committee created on January 6 in the previous Democratic-majority Congress. Not exactly: The portion of the bill that the convicted Jan. 6 rioter quoted Musk cited has nothing to do with internal House investigations.
Rather, it is intended to clarify that House data stored on external digital platforms remains under the control of House offices – and is thus subject to House rules and procedures for accessing it: “A House office is deemed to have retain all House data from the House office, regardless of the use” of a particular platform, the bill reads.
Musk also gave oxygen to an untrue claim when he reposted a screenshot from conservative account Libs from TikTok, claiming the legislation would fund “bioweapons labs.”
That’s not true: The provision in question would establish regional biocontainment laboratories as part of a larger pandemic preparedness plan. Their stated purpose is “to conduct biomedical research in support of public health and medical preparedness,” not to create bioweapons. The provision is part of the long-awaited reauthorization of the Pandemic and All Hazards Preparedness and Response Act.
David Lim and Ben Leonard contributed to this report.
