Senate Democrats are in a no-win situation.
With less than two days until a potential federal government shutdown, they are facing two options: Either back a Republican plan to keep the government open, and give away their first bit of leverage since President Donald Trump took office. Or force a shutdown that many worry would only lead to deeper cuts to the federal workforce.
“You have two things that are truly abhorrent. When you get to that level, it’s hard to rank one versus the other. That’s why it’s a hard decision,” says Democratic Sen. John Hickenlooper of Colorado. “They are both such great evils.”
Why We Wrote This
A government shutdown could happen on March 14 if the House and Senate can’t agree on a bill. After the House passed a bill with basically only Republican votes, Senate Democrats are facing a difficult set of choices, with no good options.
House Republicans passed a bill on Tuesday that would keep the government open through September, while handing more power to President Trump to shift around funds, cutting real domestic spending, and punishing the District of Columbia by forcing the city to make deep spending cuts even though its budget is funded by local taxpayer money.
Democrats are outraged at the provisions, and are facing fierce demands from their base to do something, anything, to stand up to Mr. Trump as he and billionaire Elon Musk slash the government workforce. But if they force a shutdown starting at 12:01 a.m. Saturday morning, many worry it will backfire. The Trump administration will be in charge of implementing that shutdown, which means it will determine which workers are “essential” and must keep working for no pay, and which can be sent home. And as the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) cuts a wide swath through the federal workforce, Democrats worry that could make it even easier for the administration to fire people – while putting the blame on them.
While Republicans have often leveraged government shutdowns – or the threat of them – to extract major policy wins over the past decade-plus, Democrats, as the more pro-government party, have been far more reluctant to do so. The lone exception came early in Mr. Trump’s first term, when Democrats triggered a brief shutdown over immigration issues before quickly folding. But this time, it’s unclear which step would better protect government employees and the work they do. The Trump administration is already slashing programs and staff left and right. And this is one of the few moments where Democrats have any real power.
The showdown comes as the Trump administration continues its widespread, and potentially illegal, evisceration of the federal government. Even as Senate Democrats were debating the least terrible path forward, the Department of Education announced it was laying off about half of its workforce – 1,300 employees – the latest in a series of deep government cuts not authorized by Congress. So far, the Trump administration, aided by Mr. Musk’s DOGE team, has laid off tens of thousands of government workers across various agencies, and is signaling even deeper cuts to come.
Democrats emerged from the latest in a series of long, tense lunch meetings on Wednesday, from which raised voices could be heard in the halls, with a simulacrum of a strategy: They’d demand a vote on extending government funding at current levels for one month, giving appropriators time to work out a longer extension.
“Republicans do not have the votes in the Senate” to pass the Republican House bill, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Wednesday afternoon on the Senate floor.
But Democrats’ measure appears to be more of a face-saving effort than one that could actually work. If enough Democrats vote to consider the House bill, and their amendment then fails, as seems likely, Republicans can then pass it without Democratic votes. Both sides expect that in the end Democrats are more likely than not to allow the Republican bill to pass.
Senate Republicans have scheduled a procedural vote for Friday. They will likely need eight Senate Democrats to vote with them to move forward. As the deadline approached, some Democrats who often back bipartisan measures signaled they’re not interested in helping out.
Senator Hickenlooper told the Monitor Wednesday afternoon that he thought both options risked making it easier for President Trump and Mr. Musk “to drive their agenda” of slashing the federal workforce. But he announced on social media that evening that opposing the GOP bill and risking a government shutdown was the least bad option.
Virginia Sen. Mark Warner, one of the Senate’s more moderate and bipartisan members, came to the same conclusion. Senator Warner also represents a state with a high number of federal government workers – and has long been a supporter of Washington, D.C., just over the river from his state. On Thursday morning, he posted a video declaring that he wouldn’t vote to allow the GOP plan to proceed, saying it was a “gratuitous” and “mean-spirited” attack on D.C. and would cause damage to neighboring Virginia. He also said he would refuse to “turn over the keys with no restraint to Trump and Musk.”
The only Democrat who has publicly pledged to vote for the GOP plan is Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman. Despite his unhappiness with some of the GOP provisions of the bill, he says a shutdown would hurt Americans more and blow up in Democrats’ faces politically. He predicted “it won’t take long before [Democrats are] begging” to reopen the government.
House Democrats made the opposite calculation. All but one Democrat voted against the GOP-passed plan earlier in the week. Many expressed frustration that their Senate counterparts weren’t showing the same collective spine.
New York Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez told the Monitor, “I sure hope they don’t,” when asked how she wanted Senate Democrats to vote on the GOP plan.
“This creates a massive slush fund for Donald Trump [and] Elon Musk,” she says. “I think it is irresponsible. It removes any of the guardrails around ensuring that these funds that are appropriated are spent responsibly. I don’t think it’s right.”
It’s not just progressives like Representative Ocasio-Cortez who want their Senate colleagues to oppose the bill.
“People with two-year terms showed some courage. Let’s see what people with six-year terms will do,” Rep. Scott Peters, a moderate Democrat from California, told the Monitor as he exited the House floor after the vote.
But House Democrats’ choice to vote against the GOP bill was more theoretical. If Senate Democrats follow through, it will actually trigger a government shutdown. And the clock is ticking.
“We never want to have a shutdown, obviously. It’s not the preferred option, says centrist Michigan Democratic Sen. Gary Peters. “But we’ve got two bad options right now.”
