Senate takes first step to end record shutdown

What happened

The Senate Sunday night cleared a key first hurdle to ending the record government shutdown, now in its 41st day. Eight Democrats voted with 52 Republicans to proceed with legislation that would fund Congress and a handful of agencies and programs for the full fiscal year and finance the rest of the government through Jan. 30. In return, the Democrats secured a promise for a mid-December vote on legislation of their choosing to extend expiring Affordable Care Act subsidies, plus a temporary ban on federal layoffs, a reversal of the Trump administration’s shutdown firings and back pay for all federal workers.

Who said what

“After 40 long days, I’m hopeful we can bring this shutdown to an end,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said shortly before yesterday’s vote. Thune had “kept the Senate in session all weekend,” The Wall Street Journal said, “as lawmakers see urgency to end the shutdown amid growing airport snarls and delays in food aid being distributed to millions of Americans.”

The deal “prompted a quick and fierce backlash among Democrats, many of whom were livid that their colleagues had backed down from the party’s central demand,” a guaranteed extension of the ACA credits, The New York Times said. Even with the pledged Senate vote, they argued, the subsidies were “all but certain to die in the Republican-led Congress.” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) was among those who voted against the bill.

President Donald Trump had privately signed off on the deal, according to several GOP senators, even though it reversed many of his cuts. “It looks like we’re getting close to the shutdown ending,” Trump told reporters after returning from an NFL game Sunday night.

What next?

Senate passage of the legislation “could be several days away” if critics “object and delay the process,” The Associated Press said. Asked if he would slow-walk passage, Schumer told reporters to “ask Rand Paul.” Paul (R-Ky.), the lone GOP vote against the bill, predicted “it’ll take them five days to pass this” unless they remove an anti-hemp measure he opposes. The House, on break since Sept. 19, could “return by the end of this week to approve the deal,” Politico said, and Trump would have to sign it for the shutdown to end.

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