A long weekend away from Washington, D.C., did little to soften Senate Democrats’ resolve as they again blocked an effort to reopen the government for an eighth time Tuesday.
The beginning of mass firings promised by the Trump administration and Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought over the weekend also failed to sway Senate Democrats, led by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
One pressure point was alleviated for both sides, however, with President Donald Trump’s directive to move money around at the Pentagon to pay military service members. Their paychecks are due Oct. 15.
Still, another payday, this time for Senate staffers, is fast approaching on Oct. 20.
Both sides are still dug into the same positions that launched the shutdown earlier this month, too. Talks between the opposing factions are still ongoing but have not yet yielded a result that either side is ready to move on.
Senate Democrats want an extension to expiring Obamacare subsidies before the Nov. 1 open enrollment date, and they argue that unless Congress takes action, Americans that rely on the Affordable Care Act (ACA) tax credits will see their premiums skyrocket.
However, Trump appears unwilling to cave into Senate Democrats’ demands, and reupped Republicans’ argument that Democrats wanted to undo a total of $1.5 trillion in spending cuts from the ‘big, beautiful bill’ and clawback of funding for NPR and PBS to give, in part, to illegal immigrants.
‘I don’t want to bore you with the fact that Schumer said 100 times, ‘You should never close our government,’’ Trump told reporters at the White House. ‘But Schumer is a weakened politician. I mean, he’s going to finish his career as a failed politician, as a failed politician. He’s allowed the radical left to take over the Democrat Party.’
Senate Republicans have said that they’re open to negotiating a deal on the subsidies, with reforms to the program only after the government reopens. And Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., for now, has no intention of straying from his plan to continue to bring the House Republicans’ short-term continuing resolution (CR) to the floor again and again.
‘Democrats like to whine that Republicans aren’t negotiating, but negotiation, Mr. President, is what you do when each side has a list of demands and you need to meet in the middle,’ Thune said on the Senate floor. ‘Republicans, as I and a lot of other people pointed out, haven’t put forward any demands. Only Democrats have made demands. And by the way, very expensive demands.’
Schumer noted on the Senate floor that every time Thune has put the GOP’s bill on the floor, it has failed.
‘That means, like it or not, the Republican leader needs to work with Democrats in a bipartisan way to reopen the government, just as we did when we passed 13 CRs when I was majority leader,’ he said.
The administration’s movement on reductions in force (RIFs) over the weekend, and the lingering threat that thousands of nonessential furloughed federal employees may not get back pay once the shutdown ends have not swayed Senate Democrats.
The same trio of Senate Democratic caucus members, Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., and Angus King, I-Maine, all broke ranks with Schumer support reopening the government.
‘Donald Trump, come to the negotiating table,’ Sen. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md., said at a rally outside the OMB on Tuesday. ‘Bring down costs and prices and stop inflicting harm and terrorizing federal employees and the American people.’
While most action on Capitol Hill has ground to a halt as the shutdown continues — the House, for example, has been out of session for over three weeks — the Senate has moved on other legislation, including the 2026 National Defense Authorization Act and a massive package of Trump’s nominees. Thune also teased last week that the defense spending bill could come to the floor soon.
The latest failed attempt comes on the 14th day of the shutdown and all but ensures that the closure will last into at least a third week.
It also puts this shutdown, in particular, into historic territory. While the longest shutdown on record, from late 2018 to early 2019, was under Trump’s first term, it was only partial. A handful of appropriations bills had already passed at the time, including funding for the legislative branch and defense.
But the longest full shutdown happened over two decades earlier under former President Bill Clinton between late 1995 and early 1996. That shutdown lasted 21 days and was over a budget dispute between Clinton and then-House Speaker Newt Gingrich.
That particular dispute also led to two shutdowns in that fiscal year, the first in November and the second setting the 21-day record.