Are there any plusses to the minuses?
Takes on the Senate shutdown vote Sunday night are flowing like champagne at one of Donald Trump’s Gatsby parties. A handful of moderate Senate Democrats reached an agreement with Senate Majority Leader John Thune that moves Congress toward ending the longest government shutdown in history: 40 days through Sunday.
The Associated Press reports:
In a test vote that is the first in a series of required procedural maneuvers, the Senate voted 60-40 to move toward passing compromise legislation to fund the government and hold a later vote on extending Affordable Care Act tax credits that expire Jan. 1. Final passage could be several days away if Democrats object and delay the process.
The agreement does not guarantee the health care subsidies will be extended, as Democrats have demanded for almost six weeks. Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York voted against moving ahead with the package, along with all but eight of his Democratic colleagues.
Search on the word “cave” for a sense of the betrayal felt over seven Democrats and one independent surrendering their key demand for an extension of Obamacare subsidies. The issue has massive public support.
The bloc includes three former governors: Jeanne Shaheen (D) of New Hampshire, Angus King (I) of Maine and Maggie Hassan (D) of New Hampshire. They agreed “to vote to advance three bipartisan annual spending bills and extend the rest of government funding until late January in exchange for a mid-December vote on extending the health care tax credits.” That is, they settled for the promise of a vote to extend the subsidies that will likely fail. If it takes place at all. This is Shaheen 10 days ago: “This fight is about ensuring that we are not going to see 20 million Americans have their health insurance become unaffordable.”
The other five are Sen. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.).
CNN’s Stephen Collinson:
The agreement opened the way for a Senate vote in which eight Democratic defectors voted to break the filibuster and to clear the first hurdle to reopening the government after nearly six weeks. Their move will offer relief to millions of Americans whose lives have been severely disrupted by the shutdown.
But the compromise was opposed by some key party leaders and is already igniting a firestorm of protests from progressives who accuse their more moderate colleagues of disastrously backing down, handing President Donald Trump a victory and turning their backs on millions of Americans who can’t afford spiking health care premiums.
Mehdi Hasan rages at Zeteo, “Is there a more feckless, spineless opposition party anywhere in the democratic world?”
Brian Beutler: “Even if little happens in the next two and a half months, caving in a fight you’re winning after the public gave you a big shot in the arm to keep fighting… well, it’s a bell that can’t be unrung. If March was the product of poor morale and low self-confidence, this is throwing a fight.”
Now I’ve recently mentioned glass-half-empty progressives for whom every victory is incomplete, every bill is half a loaf, and every compromise a betrayal. Josh Marshall is not among them. So, not to add to your black-and-blue Monday, Marshall offers a counterintuitive perspective on this “deal to basically settle for nothing.” He sees a glass “two-thirds or maybe even three-quarters full.” No, really:
There was a legitimate party rebellion after the March debacle. Democratic voters demanded fight. When the time came Democrats fought. They held out for 40 days, the longest shutdown standoff in history. They put health care at the center of the national political conversation and inflicted a lot of damage on Trump. At forty days they could no longer hold their caucus together. And we got this.
That’s a sea change in how the congressional party functions. And that’s a big deal. Many people see it as some kind of epic disaster and are making all the standard threats about not voting or not contributing or whatever. That’s just not what I see. It’s a big change in the direction of the fight we need in the years to come that just didn’t go far enough. Yet.
There will be the usual calls to primary those from safe, blue states, etc., but Marshall is not as interested in the individual players as the broader dynamic. He sees this as Democrats developing muscle memory for fights yet to come. Even Scrooge learned from his glimpse of future Christmases.
So, Marshall concludes:
… don’t tell me nothing has changed or that this is some cataclysmic disaster. It’s not. This accomplished a lot. It demonstrated that Democrats can go to the mat when the public is behind them and not pay a political price. It dramatically damaged Donald Trump. It cued up the central arguments of the 2026 campaign. It just didn’t go far enough. The ball was fumbled at the end. So we need to demand more.
Additionally, Marshall notes, the December vote (if it happens) will make crystal clear that Republicans mean to launch Americans’ health care premiums into the stratosphere or completely eliminate government help while Democrats own the issue of affordability. If this deal only extends government funding through January, Democrats get a rematch. By that time, the eight spelunkers will have heard more than they care to from constituents.
A word on “affordability.” The term still feels like an abstraction to me, too impersonal, and one Democrats ought to lose. People are worried about the cost of living, the cost of groceries, their everyday struggles, etc. And they are struggling. Affordability in six syllables doesn’t speak to what they are feeling. People who talk to me out on the street respond strongly to six simple words: YOUR LIFE SHOULDN’T BE THIS HARD. They feel seen.
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