Washington, DC (WJER) - Republican Ohio U.S. Senator Rob Portman is saying he hopes negotiations in Washington can both reopen the government and strengthen border security —  but he says these talks could have gone on without the partial government shutdown. 

A year and a half ago, Portman re-introduced legislation called the End Government Shutdowns Act, which would have kept government funding intact with a one-percent reduction every 120 days to give lawmakers an incentive to get their work done. 

“Instead, we outta have a system where Congress does its best and tries to put together legislation. If we can’t get there, we just continue last year’s funding until you can figure out a way forward, and that would take shutdowns off the table,” he says.

Portman says government shutdowns wind up creating more costs in the end.  

“The government always goes back and pays people back for the time off, and it’s very inefficient for government, very difficult to plan,” he says. “A lot of employees obviously are very concerned about it because they can’t predict if they’re going to have a paycheck, and it doesn’t save taxpayers any money.”

Portman says shutting down the government needlessly disrupts the lives of government workers.

WJER RADIO