Democratic lawmakers in the U.S. Congress held out against President Donald Trump long enough to trigger the lengthiest federal government shutdown in American history. However, with several Democratic senators now agreeing to a deal to end the shutdown, the party faces the risk of losing some of the political edge they’ve gained over the past six weeks.
Throughout the shutdown, polls consistently indicated that the Democrats were winning the battle for public opinion. Most voters blamed the Republicans in Congress or President Trump more than the Democrats for the situation. Additionally, the majority of voters supported the Democrats on the core issue at the heart of the congressional standoff: the impending expiration of health insurance subsidies that could raise premiums for millions of Americans.
After enduring 40 days of the shutdown, all the Democrats have secured is a Republican commitment to hold a Senate vote on extending the subsidies, a pledge that had been on the table for weeks and a vote the Democrats are likely to lose. Republican Speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, took pleasure in this outcome, even making a reference to the television show “Seinfeld.”
Several U.S. Democratic senators have had to justify their decision to vote along with the Republicans in order to start the process of ending the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.
Johnson remarked in an interview on CNN, “It really was a shutdown about nothing. I don’t think Chuck Schumer [the Democrat minority leader in the Senate] gained anything from this aside from a political spectacle.”
It would be challenging for the Democrats to argue that they achieved tangible gains from the shutdown.
Gavin Newsom criticizes the deal as ‘pathetic’
Aside from the vote on extending the Affordable Care Act subsidies, the major concession the Democrats extracted from the Republicans simply restored the pre-shutdown status quo by rehiring over 4,000 federal workers who had been laid off.
This move has elicited strong criticism from various influential Democrats outside the Senate who wanted party leadership to continue taking a hardline stance:
- “Pathetic. This isn’t a deal. It’s a surrender,” posted California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a potential Democratic presidential contender for 2028.
- “A complete betrayal of the American people,” posted Juliana Stratton, the Illinois lieutenant governor and a U.S. Senate candidate for the upcoming year.
- Keith Olbermann, the former anchor turned commentator, described the senators as “feckless traitors” among other condemnations.
However, could the Democrats argue that they achieved some intangible benefits?
