The US government, already shaken by Donald Trump’s radical reforms, could begin shutting down entirely this weekend as Democrats grapple with the option of opposing the president’s federal funding plans — at the risk this blows up in their faces.With a Friday night deadline to fund the government or allow it to start winding down its operations, the Senate is set for a crunch vote ahead of the midnight cut-off on a Trump-backed bill passed by the House of Representatives.The package would keep the lights on through September, but Democrats are under immense pressure from their own grassroots to defy Trump and reject a text they say is full of harmful spending cuts. “If it shuts down, it’s not the Republicans’ fault. We passed a bill… If there’s a shutdown, even the Democrats admit it will be their fault,” Trump told reporters on Thursday.A handful of Democrats in Trump-supporting states — worried that they would be blamed over a stoppage with no obvious exit ramp — appear ready to incur the wrath of their own supporters by backing down. But the vote remains on a knife edge, with many Democrats yet to reveal their decision.Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson, who voted against a bill to avert a shutdown as recently as 18 months ago, urged the minority party to “put partisan politics aside and do the right thing.” “When the government shuts down, you have government employees who are no longer paid, you have services that begin to lag. It brings great harm on the economy and the people,” he told Fox News. – ‘Huge backlash’ -The funding fight is focused on opposition to Trump’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), unofficially spearheaded by tech mega-billionaire and Trump advisor Elon Musk, which is working to dramatically reduce the size of the government.DOGE aims to cut federal spending by $1 trillion this year and claims to have made savings so far of $115 billion through lease terminations, contract cancelations and firing federal workers.Its online “wall of receipts” accounts for a tiny portion of that total, however, and US media outlets have found its website to be riddled with errors, misleading math and exaggerations.Grassroots Democrats, infuriated by what they see as the SpaceX and Tesla CEO’s lawless rampage through the federal bureaucracy, want their leaders to stand up to DOGE and Trump.The funding bill is likely to need support from at least eight Democrats in the Senate, but its Republican authors ignored the minority party’s demands to protect Congress’s authority over the government’s purse strings and rein in Musk.Washington progressive representative Pramila Jayapal told CNN there would be a “huge backlash” against Senate Democrats supporting the bill. Several top Democrats have warned, however, that a shutdown could play into Musk’s hands, distracting from DOGE’s most unpopular actions, which just this week has included firing half the Education Department’s workforce.Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and Pennsylvania senator John Fetterman have both announced they would vote to keep the government open.”It’s not really a decision, it’s a Hobson’s choice: Either proceed with the bill before us, or risk Donald Trump throwing America into the chaos of a shutdown,” Schumer said in speech on the Senate floor.- Carte blanche -Schumer claimed that Musk and Trump were hoping for the government to grind to a halt.”A shutdown would give Donald Trump and Elon Musk carte blanche to destroy vital government services at a significantly faster rate than they can right now… with nobody left at the agencies to check them,” he said.Republicans control 53 seats in the 100-member Senate.Legislation in the upper chamber requires a preliminary ballot with a 60-vote threshold — designed to encourage bipartisanship — before final passage, which only needs a simple majority.  While Schumer and Fetterman are the only Democrats committed to allowing the bill to move forward, the party’s rank-and-file has not been ordered to follow suit and no other Democrats have indicated they will cross the aisle.
Thu, 13 Mar 2025 22:51:07 GMT
