End to government shutdown in sight after senators make funding deal

By Thérèse Boudreaux
The Center Square

U.S. senators finally broke the government funding impasse Sunday night, voting 60-40 to advance a bill ending the government shutdown.

The Senate must hold a final vote on the legislation and then the House must approve the legislation before the government reopens.

After Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., kept lawmakers in session over the weekend, Republicans approached Democrats with a final offer: in exchange for support to reopen the government, they would guarantee a vote on the expiring Obamacare subsidies and also reverse some of the Trump administration’s mass layoffs.

Those two concessions were as far as Republican leaders were willing to go to end the ongoing shutdown, which has lasted a record-long 40 days as Democrats held out over health care policy demands. 

Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa.; Angus King, I-Maine; and Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev.; had already voted with Republicans to reopen the government for the past few weeks.

Sens. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H.; Maggie Hassan, D-N.H.; Tim Kaine, D-Va.; Jacky Rosen, D-Nev.; and Dick Durbin, D-Ill; joined them Sunday night, breaking the filibuster.

“This bill is not perfect, but it takes important steps to reduce their shutdown’s hurt,” Durbin said. “Now that Democrats secured these wins, it’s time for Leader Thune to keep his promise to schedule a vote on the ACA tax credits in December and we will see to it that he makes good on his word for the millions of Americans worried they won’t be able to afford health care in January.”

The Senate Appropriations Committee released an updated Continuing Resolution on Sunday night, which outlines the details of Republicans’ offer.

The new CR will extend government funding to Jan. 30, which will reopen the government, avoid the risk of lawmakers ramming through a bloated omnibus in December, and give Congress enough time to finish the normal-order appropriations process.

Republicans also paired the CR with the Senate-passed minibus, which will knock out three of the 12 appropriations bills that provide fiscal year 2026 funding for federal agencies.

The minibus funds Military Construction and Veterans Affairs; the Food and Drug Administration, Agriculture department, and rural development; and the Legislative Branch.

Crucially, the deal also includes a promise that lawmakers will vote on extending the sunsetting enhanced Obamacare Premium Tax Credit. Senate Democrats had voted 14 consecutive times against reopening the government since Sept. 30 over demands that a funding deal also extend the subsidies.

A mere vote on the subsidies does not necessarily guarantee an extension, however. So Republican leaders have sweetened the deal by vowing to reverse some of the Trump administration's legally dubious Reduction-in-Force (RIF) actions, where it laid off thousands of furloughed federal workers during the shutdown. The funding deal will also prevent the administration from conducting RIFs as long as the CR remains in effect.

"After 40 days as a consistent voice against shutting our government down, I voted YES for the 15th time to REOPEN," Fetterman posted on X. "I’m sorry to our military, SNAP recipients, gov workers, and Capitol Police who haven’t been paid in weeks. It should’ve never come to this. This was a failure."