- Eight Senate Democrats and one independent voted with Republicans to end the 40-day shutdown, passing a stopgap funding bill 60-40.
- None of the defectors face reelection soon, giving them political cover to prioritize stability over party demands.
- The deal preserved short-term funding and back pay but left Affordable Care Act subsidies and major policy demands unresolved, angering progressives.
WASHINGTON—In a move that’s left their party seething, a small band of Senate Democrats—and one independent ally—crossed the aisle on Sunday to end the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.
The 60-40 vote cleared a stopgap funding bill, keeping most federal agencies humming through January 30 and ensuring back pay for the hundreds of thousands of furloughed workers who’d been caught in the crossfire.
But as the dust settles, a glaring pattern emerges among the eight who broke ranks: None of them have to face the music at the ballot box next year.
The FrankNez Media Daily Briefing newsletter provides all the news you need to start your day. Sign up here.
The shutdown, which dragged on for a grueling 40 days starting October 1, wasn’t just a logistical nightmare—it was a brutal test of wills between President Donald Trump and congressional Democrats.
Trump, staring down record-low approval ratings as polls pinned the blame squarely on Republicans, pulled out all the stops to force a deal.
He axed federally funded projects in Democratic strongholds, dangled threats to fire federal workers, and even held up supplemental nutrition payments to low-income families.
In a fit of frustration, he kept badgering Senate Republicans to nuke the filibuster and ram through his spending priorities.
But Democrats held firm at first, demanding rollbacks on GOP-proposed Medicaid cuts and an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies that were set to expire, putting health coverage for millions at risk.
Those demands? Largely unmet in the final deal. Republicans tossed in a vague promise from Senate Majority Leader John Thune for a standalone vote on the ACA subsidies by mid-December, but House Speaker Mike Johnson has stonewalled any commitment to bring it to the floor.
Come next year, that’s bad news for about 22 million Americans relying on those credits—their premiums could double overnight, according to estimates from health policy experts.
It’s the kind of cliffhanger that has progressives howling about betrayal. And howl they are. The vote has ignited what one report called a “furious civil war” inside the Democratic caucus, with lawmakers venting “near universal frustration” over the climbdown.
Democrats Get Chewed for Flipping to GOP Side
California Governor Gavin Newsom didn’t mince words, slamming the agreement as “pathetic” and a flat-out “surrender” in a weekend statement that echoed the raw anger rippling through the party.
For Democrats who’d dug in their heels against Trump’s tactics, watching colleagues fold felt like watching the Alamo fall without a fight. So who were the defectors, and why did they pull the trigger?
Let’s break it down senator by senator, because the roster tells a story all its own. Leading the charge were two longtime players bowing out on their own terms: Illinois’ Dick Durbin and New Hampshire’s Jeanne Shaheen, both key architects of the compromise.
Durbin, the Senate’s No. 2 Democrat and a fixture since 1997, announced last year he’s retiring at the end of his term in 2026—no reelection headaches for him. Shaheen, who’d been pushing for a middle ground amid the chaos, is following suit, stepping away after decades in the Senate.
For these two, the vote was less about political survival and more about brokering peace before the holidays. Then there’s the Class of 2028 crew, a mix of battle-tested incumbents and relative newcomers who won’t see a primary challenge for four more years.
New Hampshire’s Maggie Hassan, elected in the 2016 blue wave, stuck with her senior colleague on the deal.
Pennsylvania’s John Fetterman, the tattooed progressive firebrand who flipped a red-state seat in 2022, surprised some by voting yes—perhaps weighing the human cost of prolonged shutdown pain against party purity.
Nevada’s Catherine Cortez Masto, the first Latina senator from her state, and her junior counterpart Jacky Rosen rounded out the Silver State’s pair, both prioritizing stability over standoff.
Finally, the long-haul holdouts: Virginia’s Tim Kaine and Maine Independent Angus King, who caucuses with Democrats.
Kaine, known for his steady-hand foreign policy chops, isn’t up until 2030. King, the quirky ex-governor turned senator, faces the same timeline.
For all these folks, the midterms are a distant horizon—far enough away that voter backlash over this perceived cave-in might fade into the background noise of endless cable news cycles.
It’s a lineup that underscores a brutal truth of Capitol Hill life: Incumbency comes with insulation. These eight lawmakers, representing about a third of the Democratic conference’s non-vulnerable seats, could afford to prioritize pragmatism over principle.
Contrast that with senators like Mark Kelly of Arizona or Raphael Warnock of Georgia, who are neck-deep in reelection fights next year and stayed firmly in the no camp, voting against the bill alongside most of their party.
What Will Happen Now?
The fallout is already reshaping party dynamics. Progressive activists are drawing up scorecards, vowing to remember who blinked first when fundraising calls go out.
And with the ACA subsidies hanging in limbo—Johnson’s coy non-committal leaving little room for optimism—the deal feels more like a truce than a triumph. As one anonymous Democratic aide put it to reporters, “We stopped the bleeding, but we didn’t fix the wound.”
For Trump, though, it’s a rare win amid the shutdown’s self-inflicted wounds. His approval nosedived to historic lows, with even Fox News confronting Johnson on camera about polls showing public fury aimed at the GOP.
Reopening the government buys him breathing room, but it doesn’t erase the images of pink-shirted federal workers protesting on the National Mall or the stories of families scraping by without paychecks.
As Congress limps into the new year, the real battle shifts to those subsidies and the broader health care wars.
Will Thune’s promised vote materialize, or was it just smoke?
And can Democrats regroup from this internal rift in time to channel that frustration into something sharper for 2026?
For now, the eight who voted yes get to exhale—while the rest of the party braces for the long scroll ahead.
Also Read: A DOJ Whistleblower Now Makes Revelation That Undermines the Judicial System’s Integrity
