The government shutdown is here, partially because a pair of GW alumni couldn’t find common ground to lead their delegations and stop it.

GW’s two most powerful political alumni – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and House Majority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va. – have remained at odds this week as a partisan stalemate forced the government to a halt.

“We will do everything we can to protect Americans against the harmful effects of Obamacare. This bill does that. We’re united in the House as Republicans,” Cantor said Saturday night, according to the Washington Post. “Now it’s up to the Senate Democrats to answer.”

But Reid fired back, calling Cantor’s proposal “pointless” even before the House had a chance to vote on it.

“As I have said repeatedly, the Senate will reject any Republican attempt to force changes to the Affordable Care Act through a mandatory government funding bill,” Reid said in a statement. “After weeks of futile political games from Republicans, we are still at square one.”

Cantor, who graduated GW in 1985, has been active on campus since he was elected in 2001. He has spoken at GW several times, most recently at GW Hillel in 2012, which he was a member of during his undergraduate years.

But Reid, who graduated from the GW Law School in 1964, has been public about his resentment towards GW.

In his recent memoir, Reid said he nearly dropped out after he was declined financial aid. Reid said he refused to donate to GW after graduating, and did not return until he gave the school’s commencement address in 2005.