Congressional lawmakers and their aides are bracing for a shutdown that appears inevitable after President Trump canceled a meeting planned for Thursday with Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) and House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries (N.Y.).

Senate Democrats have said they cannot vote for any House-passed government funding bill if GOP leaders refuse to sit down and talk with them, but Republicans say there’s nothing to negotiate, framing next week’s vote on a "clean" continuing resolution to keep the government open as a take-it-or-leave-it proposition.

“I think there’s a 99 percent chance that there’s a shutdown. There just doesn’t seem to be any endgame for either party to get out of a shutdown,” said Brian Darling, a GOP strategist and former Senate aide.

“Republicans want to show that they want to get their priorities funded and I think the Democrats need to dig in and show that they can fight. I think both parties have an incentive from their base to shut their government down, it’s just a matter of how long,” he said.

Trump has made it clear he’s not ready to offer any concessions to Schumer and Jeffries. He’s also prepared to make the shutdown as painful as possible for Democrats by prioritizing funding for Republican requests and shifting money from Democratic-leaning states to GOP strongholds.

Jonathan Kott, a Democratic strategist and former Senate aide, said Trump is provoking Democrats to block any Republican-drafted government funding bill by refusing to consider their requests to address rising health........

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