By Bo Erickson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -Republican fiscal hawks in Congress are making a new pitch in the struggle to end the longest government shutdown in U.S. history: Continue to spend at the same rate as last year for as long as possible.

That approach would not cut discretionary spending but also not add to the roughly one-quarter of the $7 trillion federal budget that lawmakers are fighting about, and to some observers also represents a resignation that the deeply divided institution is unlikely to agree on a path forward anytime soon.

The idea did not have broad support among President Donald Trump’s Republicans, who hold majorities in the Senate and House of Representatives, and would mean they were ready to leave the budget essentially unchanged from levels agreed to under Democr

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