Sen. Mitch McConnell announces August recess cancelled
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced on Tuesday that the traditional August recess has been cancelled, citing "obstruction by Senate Democrats."
"Due to the historic obstruction by Senate Democrats of the president's nominees, and the goal of passing appropriations bills prior to the end of the fiscal year, the August recess has been canceled. Senators should expect to remain in session in August to pass legislation, including appropriations bills, and to make additional progress on the president's nominees," McConnell said in a statement.
According to McConnell, it's expected that Senators will have a "state work period" during the first full week in August before returning to Capitol Hill for the rest of the month.
"The amount of work we have to do is inconceivable to me we can't use these weeks. Even with cooperation we've got a lot of appripraition bills to pass, we got this backlog of nominations certainly we anticipate and hope to have less obstruction on those but I've been hoping for that for quite some time," McConnell told reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday
He added, "We have enough work to do for the American people that we should be here during those weeks."
Meanwhile, Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer said that his party welcomes the additional time in August which he says will give Democrats the opportunity to address the issue of health care reform. "We welcome the opportunity to address it and work in August to require our Republican colleagues to do something about it," Schumer added.
Schumer noted that lawmakers expect and want President Trump to be working alongside members of Congress during the month as well.
Congressional leaders have traditionally threatened to cancel the summer recess amid mounting legislative agendas.
This is a developing story and will be updated.