Piers Morgan challenged Republican congressman James Lankford on Tuesday night over why he should continue to get paid during the government shutdown.
The government shut down on Tuesday after Congress failed to reach a spending agreement that funds Obamacare. Morgan hosted Lankford to discuss why Republicans insist on fighting the health care law at the cost of closing the government.
Later, an audience member asked Lankford, "Do you think it's fair that Congress is going to continue to get paid while more than 800,000 government employees are furloughed?"
He replied that employees were paid retroactively after past government shutdowns, and assumed that would happen this time as well. It is not certain, as the Wall Street Journal noted, that retroactive pay will be issued.
"Why should the very people who have caused the shutdown continue to be paid when the victims of the shutdown are not being paid?" Morgan pressed.
Lankford replied that members of the House of Representatives are paid once a month and said that he has "sent in a letter" requesting that his pay be withheld if the shutdown is not resolved at the end of the pay cycle.
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