Senate Democrats' impending choice: Shutdown or surrender

Senate Democrats have a fast-approaching dilemma: Vote for a spending bill unilaterally drafted by House Republicans or engage in the kind of shutdown brinkmanship they’ve long opposed.

It isn’t a decision they’ll be able to put off for much longer. House GOP leaders are poised early next week to send a bill to the floor that would largely hold current spending levels in place through the end of September. Democrats don’t like this approach, arguing it would only further empower President Donald Trump and Elon Musk to continue to act beyond their authority in clawing back congressionally approved dollars.

In the House, Democrats are vowing to hold back support, arguing that Republicans are responsible for finding the votes for a continuing resolution, or CR, after walking away from negotiations with the minority party.

“If Republicans decide to take that approach, as Speaker [Mike] Johnson indicated it's his expectation, then Republicans are going it alone," House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters Thursday.

It’s not so simple in the Senate, where Democratic leaders are being more careful to avoid promising blanket opposition to a relatively “clean” stopgap bill ahead of the March 14 shutdown deadline. Privately, leaders have urged their members to stay silent and force Republicans to come up with a palatable plan.

Sen. Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, said in a brief interview Thursday he didn’t sense there were enough Democratic senators yet willing to clear a seven-month stopgap — Republicans need at least eight, assuming more GOP lawmakers don’t join Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, who has pledged to vote no.

Still, when pressed if he would oppose that bill if it was the only option on the table just hours before the shutdown deadline, Durbin hedged, saying that it was premature until he saw what gets through the House.

“Ask me after that,” he added.

While a handful of Democrats indicated in interviews that they are a no, so far Republicans have at least one Democrat on their side: Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, who said in a brief interview Thursday that “I'm never going to be a part of any vote that shuts the government down.”

“The fact that anyone on our side would even rattle those sabers, that's bullshit,” Fetterman said. “To think I'm going to burn the village down to save it, that’s bonkers.”

Roughly a dozen other Senate Democrats declined in interviews this week to say explicitly they would vote against a shutdown-averting bill. Several lawmakers said they want to know for sure that this bill would be the only way to avoid a lapse in federal funding before committing to supporting it. They also said they want to see proof that Speaker Mike Johnson can actually get it through the House.

“There's enough Senate Republicans who have told us that they support the idea of a short-term CR and completing all the bills,” said Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), adding that before he makes a decision on a House bill, “I want to make sure that play is not available."

Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) described himself as “anti-shutdown” and that Musk’s ascension “makes it even more perilous to shut down” because it would only further embolden him. But Kaine — who, like Van Hollen, has a large share of federal workers in his state — also declined to say how he would vote on a September funding patch if one comes to the Senate floor.

A group of Democrats and Republicans in the Senate have been quietly talking about a back-up option if the House isn’t able to pass its stopgap bill — not an unthinkable scenario, given the GOP’s razor-thin majority. Several of those Democrats emphasized their preference is to pursue a government funding path that gives space to senior appropriators who still insist they’re close to an agreement on updated agency funding levels.

“We're real close to a deal,” said Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), an Appropriations Committee member. “We should get that done.”

One option being floated by Democrats is a four- to five-week stopgap to give appropriators more time to land that deal. But Republicans involved in the bicameral negotiations warned that they don’t believe their House counterparts are ready to accept anything other than an extension of current funding levels through the end of the fiscal year.

“My best guess right now is that the House will pass or attempt to pass a full-year CR,” Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) told reporters. Asked about the possibility of a shorter stopgap, she added, “I do not think the House is interested in that.”

Mia McCarthy, Lisa Kashinsky, Nicholas Wu and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.

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