There’s some maneuvering taking place this week but it looks like the bottom line is we’re still heading for a government shutdown at the end of this month. As you may recall, Democrats have been making demands that Republicans agree to extend Obamacare subsidies in order to get enough votes to defeat a filibuster in the Senate. Today, Republicans said those demands would not be met.
Republican leaders in the House and Senate said Wednesday that they will reject Democratic demands for an immediate extension of health care subsidies , challenging Democrats to vote against a stopgap spending bill that doesn’t include them but will keep the government open at the end of the month.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said Democrats “have a choice to make” as the Sept. 30 deadline approaches. They can work with Republicans, Thune said, or “they can shut down the government with all that will mean for the American people.”…
It’s a high-stakes game of brinksmanship for the Democrats, in particular, as the party’s base urges them to fight harder and many wager that a shutdown would force Republicans to negotiate with them on health care and other issues.
“Democrats don’t want a shutdown, but Republicans cannot shut Democrats out of the process and pretend like the last nine months have been business as usual,” Schumer said.
Of course we all remember this same gambit played out in March and, in the end, Sen. Schumer caved and got enough Democrats to vote with Republicans to avoid a shutdown. But it looks like he learned his lesson from that experience. The Democratic base wants the party to oppose Trump even if it a) accomplishes nothing and b) results in a short term disaster. This time Schumer is going to comply.
Democrats on both sides of the Capitol are watching Schumer closely after his last-minute decision in March to vote with Republicans to keep the government open. Schumer argued then that a shutdown would be damaging and would give President Donald Trump and his White House freedom to make more government cuts. Many on the left revolted, with some advocates calling for his resignation…
…Schumer says that things have changed since March . The public is more wary of Trump and Republicans, Schumer says, after the passage this summer of Trump’s “big, beautiful bill” that cut Medicaid and other government programs.
The Republican response to Democratic demands has been to present a mostly clean CR which would extend government funding until November.
House Republicans plan to try to extend government funding through Nov. 21 to buy more time for bipartisan spending negotiations and avoid an Oct. 1 federal shutdown…
Republicans say they intended to make the funding extension, known as a continuing resolution, as “clean” as possible, meaning it does not include policy priorities favorable to either side. It does include a bipartisan agreement to spend more on security for lawmakers after the deadly shooting of conservative activist Charlie Kirk, and another provision to allow D.C. to use its locally raised funds — reversing a measure from March that has prevented the District from spending about $1 billion of its own money.
“We need responsible options here to keep the government open while all this work continues, and Republicans are committed to making that happen,” House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana) told reporters Tuesday. “Predictably and unfortunately, there are some Democrats who are openly pining for a government shutdown.”
Just like the Democratic stunt in which lawmakers fled Texas to prevent a vote (on a bill which eventually passed anyway) this whole effort is about headlines. Democrats are convinced they can win this PR battle.
By vowing to oppose the temporary measure to keep the government open, Democrats risk being blamed by the public for the consequences of a shutdown like interruptions to government services and benefits.
“It comes down to public opinion and who is able to convince the public that that they’re not the ones being stubborn and obstinate, but actually are fighting for the right thing,”said Chris Devine, an associate professor of political science at the University of Dayton. “If Democrats want to fight this out and can sell the American people on the reason for that, then they might come out better from such a fight. But if they’re not going to be able to win that messaging war, they might be wise to come to the best compromise they can live with.”
Of course it helps tremendously that Democrats have the bulk of the national media on their side and that the have a base willing to believe anything about Republicans. So here’s what’s probably going to happen over the next few days.
So, staring into the crystal ball – and speaking with senior sources from both sides – the following could happen in the Senate:
The Senate gets the interim spending bill from the House on Friday afternoon. Both sides waive all of the rules and clocks in order to have two “show” votes sometime on Friday or Friday night.
Republicans will insist on having a vote to break a filibuster on the motion to proceed to the House-passed bill. That needs 60 yeas. There are 53 Senate Republicans. Fox is told that Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is expected to be a no on the procedural vote.
That means eight Democrats would have to join Republicans to vote to break the filibuster to hit the 60-vote threshold. That is not going to happen.
The Senate would then vote in similar fashion on starting debate on the Democrats’ still-unwritten plan. The Senate would subject that vote to a 60 threshold. That too will fall short, since there are only 47 senators who caucus with the Democrats.
The result is no weekend session so Republicans get to attend Charlie Kirk’s funeral on Sunday. Then lawmakers will all return as soon as next Wednesday night (after Rosh Hashanah) and they will have a little less than a week to duke it out in public before the shutdown deadline at the end of the month. In short, they will punt this until the final week and all the real fireworks will happen then.
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