The US government is on the brink of a shutdown after the Senate on Tuesday rejected competing plans to extend funding beyond midnight.
Senate Democrats blocked legislation put forward by the Republican majority to fund the government through 21 November, while Republicans united to stop a separate Democratic-backed measure that would have extended healthcare benefits and other priorities. Both proposals failed to clear the 60-vote threshold for advancement in the chamber.
The Democratic plan failed in a 47-53 vote. The Republican vote fell short in a 45-55 vote, with all Democrats but two – John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada – opposing it. Angus King, an independent of Maine who caucuses with Democrats, also supported the measure, while Republican senator Rand Paul, a fiscal hawk, voted against it.
The deadlock persisted even after the president convened an Oval Office meeting of the two parties’ congressional leaders on Monday evening, which concluded with no signs of a breakthrough.
Asked at the White House on Tuesday afternoon whether a shutdown was inevitable, Trump replied, “Nothing is inevitable, but I would say it’s probably likely,” before going on to falsely accuse Democrats of wanting to provide healthcare to undocumented immigrants.
The meeting was seen as the last best chance to ward off a shutdown. But hours after it concluded, the president posted on social media an AI-generated video showing the top House Democrat, Hakeem Jeffries wearing a sombrero and mustache and standing alongside the top Senate Democrat Chuck Schumer, with the latter saying,“Not even Black people want to vote for us anymore. Even Latinos hate us.”
“The next time you have something to say about me, don’t cop out through a racist and fake AI video,” Jeffries, who had met Trump for the first time on Monday, said at the Capitol the following day. “When I’m back in the Oval Office, say it to my face.”
Republicans passed their funding bill through the House of Representatives on a near party-line vote earlier this month, but Democrats refused to support it without concessions.
The minority party is demanding an extension of premium tax credits for Affordable Care Act (ACA) health plans, which expire at the end of the year. They also want to undo Republican cuts to Medicaid, the program providing healthcare to poor and disabled Americans, and public media outlets.
The total cost of those provisions is expected to hit $1tn, while about 10 million people are expected to lose healthcare due to the Medicaid cuts, as well as to changes to the ACA. And without an extension of the tax credits for premiums, health insurance prices will rise for around 20 million people.
Republican congressional leaders had shown no signs of shifting in their demand for approval of their spending bill, which they say is intended to give appropriators more time to reach an agreement on long-term government spending. The Senate majority leader John Thune has said he would be willing to negotiate over the ACA subsidies, but only after the government was funded.
In a floor speech on Tuesday, Thune urged Democrats to break from their leadership.
“The far left’s determination to oppose anything President Trump has ever said or done is not a good reason for subjecting the American people to the pain of a government shutdown,” he said.
Any changes to the Republican spending bill negotiated in the Senate would have to be approved by the House, but the speaker, Mike Johnson, has kept the chamber in recess for the past week and a half, in a bid to pressure Democrats into swallowing the bill as is. When the House held a brief procedural session at noon on Tuesday, Democrats filled the chamber in a failed effort to force consideration of their own bill to fund the government through October while also addressing their healthcare priorities.
Republican representative Morgan Griffith swiftly gaveled the chamber out of session, prompting boos from the Democratic lawmakers.
“Just a moment ago, I put forward a plan to keep the government open. Republicans tanked it so they could remain on vacation while Americans struggle with the healthcare crisis they’ve created,” Rosa DeLauro, the top Democrat on the appropriations committee, said after the session concluded.
Speaking moments before the Democrats’ funding proposal failed, Republican senator Ted Cruz described Democrats’s shutdown threat as a “temper tantrum” that would ultimately go nowhere.
“They’re trying to show … that they hate Trump,” Cruz, who played a major role in leading a 2013 shutdown aimed at defunding the Affordable Care Act, told reporters. “It will end inevitably in capitulation. At some point they’re going to turn the lights on again, but first they have to rage into the night.”
A shutdown would begin Wednesday at midnight, and see federal agencies curtail operations and keep employees home. Last week, the White House office of management and budget released a memo saying it would exploit a lapse in funding to carry out more mass firings as part of its crusade to slash government bureaucracy.
While the party that instigates a shutdown has historically failed to achieve their goals, polls have given mixed verdicts on how the public views the Democrats’ tactics.
A New York Times/Siena poll taken last week found that only 27% of respondents said the Democrats should shut down the government, while 65% thought they should not. Among Democrats, the split was 47% in favor of a shutdown and 43% against, while 59% of independents were opposed to a shutdown.
A Marist poll released on Tuesday found that 38% of voters would blame congressional Republicans for a shutdown, while 27% would blame the Democrats, and 31% would point a finger at both parties equally.
