Eight Democrats Vote for Cloture on CR Bill, Securing Only Minor Concessions

Eight Democrats gave up the ghost and voted to end the filibuster. In case you're not up to speed on how this works, before a vote on the actual merits of a bill can happen, the Senate must vote for "cloture," for the closing of all debate on the bill. This requires 60, not 50, votes, though the vote on the bill itself requires 51 (or 50 plus a VP tie-breaker vote).

Eight Democrats just voted for cloture so that the entire Senate can now vote on the bill itself. The vote was 60-40, with eight Democrats joining the Republicans to end debate, and grandstanding douchebag Rand Paul of course joining the Democrats to show how pure and virtuous he is.

OSZ @OpenSourceZone

Senate breaks Dem filibuster on to end the government shutdown

8 Dems vote YES
🔵 Durbin
🔵 Kaine
🔵 King
🔵 Shaheen
🔵 Rosen
🔵 Hassan
🔵Fetterman
🔵 Cortez Masto

1 GOP NO
🔴 Rand Paul

Apparently John Cornyn wasn't present for the vote for a while and had to fly to DC to finally cast the 60th vote. Rand Paul of course would not supply that last vote. When the RINO John Cornyn finally made it into work, he voted "Yes" to end debate.

Thune did not "cave," as people had worried, to get the cloture vote. Some concessions were made, which I guess you can object to on principle. But the left is going berserk over how little the Democrats got so I guess by negative inference we can say that Thune "won," mostly.

I don't know if it's true that the "Democrats lost everything in the shutdown" as PJ Media's Matt Margolis says, but it does seem like they got doodly squat and they only got 30% of the doodly they demanded.

This is what capitulation looks like, and the left knows it.

The deal is simple. Schumer's caucus agreed to advance a package of spending bills that will reopen the government and extend funding through January.

That's it.

No sweeping policy concessions, no big wins tucked into the fine print, no "historic framework" or "moral victory." Just a basic continuing resolution, dressed up with some boilerplate back pay for furloughed workers and funding for food assistance through next fall. In other words, exactly what Republicans had put on the table before the Democrats decided to make a scene.

This shutdown began because Schumer thought he could strongarm the GOP into extending Obamacare subsidies that were set to expire and repealing Medicaid reforms that closed a loophole handing out free healthcare to illegal immigrants. President Trump and Republican leaders had already said they planned to address those subsidies separately, aiming to rein them in and curb abuse. But Schumer wanted drama. He shut down the government over it, thinking Republicans would blink.

They didn't.

Although there is nothing being added to the CR itself that can be called a concession to Democrats, Thune and the Republicans did make some minor promises about what they'll grant the Democrats in exchange for a cloture vote:

OSZ @OpenSourceZone

Proposed Government Funding Bill To End The Government Shutdown:

🔴 Fund the government through January 31
🔴 Promise to vote on ACA subsidies in December
🔴 Reverse the mass layoffs of federal workers (RIFs) since Oct. 1
🔴 Provide full-year funding for Veterans Affairs
🔴 Provide full-year funding for SNAP

On the last two, I don't know what's being given up here. This is my guess: Democrats want SNAP and Veterans Affairs funded now for a full year so if they shut the government down again, they will not have to worry about their EBT army shrieking about "starving." As far as Veterans Affairs -- I dunno, Democrats don't really care about veterans.

On YouTube, Dr. Steve Turley says that that guarantee of a restoration of the jobs Trump cut during the shutdown isn't as big a concession as it seems. He says that while Republicans agree to restore those positions...

1, it does not require Trump to re-hire the people fired from those positions. He can hire other people. MAGA people.

2, it doesn't actually even require Trump to hire anyone. The Republicans agree that these positions will be restored, but there's no promise those positions will be filled.

Is that accurate? Not sure. I heard it from a guy on a webcam.

The last concession is that Republicans agree to a vote on the endless "emergency covid" Obamacare subsidies. I think this means they agree they will not demand a 60-vote threshold for cloture, but they guarantee a vote on the merits. Republicans have 53 votes and I'm almost certain that the Democrat in RINO clothing Lisa Murkoswski will vote for these supposedly temporary emergency covid subsidies, and so will the liberal "Republican" Bill Cassidy in Lousiana. I can imagine another couple of votes coming from the likes of Susan Collins and Tom Tillis (who still plagues us as he's not out of the Senate yet).

Democrats would need 51 votes to get these "temporary emergency covid subsidies" extended.

So I do think that's a concession. I do think that is a very real chit we gave the Democrats.

On the other hand, the Democrats were sabotaging the economy to try to win the 2026 midterms and set the stage for a 2028 win so... pick your poison.

These people aren't "Traitors," mostly -- they're following orders. As Mark Halperin observed, Chuck Schumer's plan was always to pretend that he is still ready to fight the Republicans until the last overweight EBT charity case dies of starvation. But he will end the shutdown by telling his "moderate" purple-state soldiers to stand down and pretend to "stab him in the back." That way he can still say he's a "Democrat Who Fights" in his 2026 primary battle with AOC.

Dick Durbin, for example, is one of the most partisan, nasty, cynical operators there is, but he was asked to vote to end the shutdown because he is retiring and has no fear of a more stridently left-wing challengers.

No big surprise, but nasty progressive nepo baby Matt Yglesias, who shows how "tough" a prog he is by routinely defending lying as a valid political tool, says that the shutdown was a success because it damaged Trump's poll numbers and got Republicans to fight.

I will write more later about this... if I must. On a personal level, I'm pro-ending-the-shutdown, because this is one of the least compelling things to have to write about. I know that's not a good reason to support ending the shutdown but what I can I say?

How is y'all? Did you have a good weekend?

Mine was a loss. I got very little sleep both nights and just vegged and did nothing productive nor fun for 48 hours.

posted by Ace at 12:15 PM

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