U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer looks down during a press conference following a Senate vote on Monday.Jonathan Ernst/Reuters
The Democratic Party splintered into new in-fighting as a handful of its U.S. senators voted to reopen the federal government without a Republican guarantee to extend an expiring health care subsidy.
The deal struck in the U.S. Senate with support from eight members of the Democratic caucus presages an end to the longest shutdown in the country’s history, which has kept food benefits from low-income people and on Sunday alone contributed to the cancellation of nearly 3,000 flights.
It also promises bitter new legislative battles over the future of U.S. health care, which President Donald Trump has vowed to reshape.
Senators on Monday voted to fast-track consideration of a package of bills to reopen government at a legislative session that extended deep into the evening. The legislation, which passed Monday night, now requires approval in the House of Representatives, where Republicans hold a sufficient majority to vote it through. On Monday, Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson urged representatives to rush back to Washington.
“I’m grateful the end is in sight,” said Senate Majority Leader John Thune, a South Dakota Republican. The American people, he said, “have suffered for long enough.”
Trump demands air traffic controllers return to work as flight cancellations continue to soar
Democratic caucus members who broke ranks to support the deal helped Republicans assemble the 60 votes sufficient to overcome a Senate filibuster. They argued that they had no choice, openly acknowledging failure in the party’s attempt to push Republicans to permanently extend health care subsidies — or even, as a fallback, to renew them for an additional year. On Monday evening, a last-ditch Democratic amendment to renew that funding for 12 months also failed.
Instead, Mr. Thune has promised to allow a Senate vote on health care funding before the end of this year. Mr. Johnson, however, would not commit on Monday to allowing such a vote in the House of Representatives.
“Standing up to Donald Trump didn’t work,” Senator Angus King, a Maine independent who caucuses with Democrats, told MSNBC. ”It actually gave him more power.”
Mr. Trump, meanwhile, was triumphant. Chuck Schumer, the Democratic Leader in the Senate, “thought he could break the Republicans and the Republicans broke him,” the President told Fox News Monday.
The deal with Republicans ensures federal funding only until Jan. 30, but will reverse federal layoffs during the current shutdown, which on Monday reached its 41st day.
U.S. President Donald Trump said on Monday (November 10) the deal to end the government shutdown was “very good.” The longest government shutdown in U.S. history could end this week after a compromise that would restore federal funding cleared an initial Senate hurdle late on Sunday, though it was unclear when Congress would give its final approval.
Reuters
Nonetheless, it brought intense rebukes from across the Democratic party. Bernie Sanders, a liberal senator, wrote on X: “8 Democrats caved.” Gavin Newsom, the California Governor and prominent critic of Mr. Trump, accused his fellow Democrats of “playing by the old set of rules.”
“They have rolled over a little bit,” he said Monday, adding: “right now, we’ve got to hold the line, because I think America will become unrecognizable in a year or two unless we fight back.”
On the Senate floor, Democrats accused their own party members of looting the fortunes of poorer Americans who rely on federally subsidized health care.
”The American people want us to stop this health care heist. They don’t want Democrats to be driving the getaway car,” said Senator Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat. He warned Republicans, too, that the electorate will “remember your vote if you do not solve this problem. Thanksgiving is going to be the worst Thanksgiving ever for millions of families knowing that they’re going to lose their health insurance.”
At issue are enhanced premium tax credits that, without legislative intervention, will expire at the end of this year, raising the cost of benchmark insurance for the roughly 22 million Americans who rely on coverage under the Affordable Care Act, which is also known as Obamacare.
The deal to back the spending package promises to fully fund food stamp payments for a year under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, guarantees back pay to all federal workers and includes three major spending bills to keep money flowing through 2026 to veterans, farmers and legislative services.
“It’s reasonable, it’s responsible and it’s ready to go,” said John Barrasso, the Republican Senate majority whip.
But it does little to resolve contentious debates over the future of federal programs that form the bedrock of assistance to poorer Americans.
Traders brace for market volatility from deluge of delayed U.S. government data
On health care, Mr. Trump has advocated a radical adjustment to how the federal government subsidizes costs. In a series of social media posts over the weekend, he decried Affordable Care Act coverage that he called “a windfall for Health Insurance Companies, and a DISASTER for the American People.”
Instead, he said Monday, “we want a health care system where we pay the money to the people instead of the insurance companies. And I tell you, we’re going to be working on that very hard over the next short period of time.”
Democrats, in response, spoke out against what Washington Senator Patty Murray called the revival of “the old bad ideas machine.“
Mr. Schumer, the Democratic Senate Leader, said his party will do its best to make Republicans pay a political price.
“When four million Americans lose insurance, when kids with cancer are priced out of coverage, when families face financial ruin — they’ll know Republicans made it happen,” Mr. Schumer said.