As of today, the current government shutdown is now tied with longest shutdown ever. Tomorrow it will become the record holder. But Politico is reporting that there are clear signs Democrats finally appear to be running out of shutdown steam.
Democrats showed unmistakable signs of splintering Monday as the government shutdown reached the cusp of setting an all-time record.
While many are still demanding their colleagues dig in and fight, a critical mass of Democratic senators appear to be engaged in serious talks about bringing an end to the five-week stalemate.
As Sen. Thune made clear in a speech today, Republicans only need five more Democrats to join them to pass the clean CR that has already been rejected 14 times. But now it seems there are Democrats thinking about who is going to fill those slots.
[Democratic] senators met behind closed doors Monday night in a Capitol hideaway office.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), who has been involved in informal bipartisan talks since before the shutdown started, said in a brief interview afterward she hoped there would be a resolution to the shutdown this week...
“I sense that people are tired of this shutdown and all that flows from it,” said Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), the No. 2 party leader, who added that the bipartisan interlocutors he has spoken to “seem more optimistic.”
Sen. Shaheen was joined at that meeting by Sens. Chris Coons, Mark Kelly, Gary Peters, Maggie Hassan, Jon Ossoff, Catherine Cortez Masto and Jackie Rosen. Angus King, the Independent, was also there. Both Cortez Masto and King have already been voting with Republicans to reopen.
Another sign that Democrats are coming closer to climbing off this ledge, some of their left-wing members are urging them to keep fighting.
“We have the moral responsibility to stand up and fight for the 15 million people who are about to lose health care,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said in an interview Monday. “What the polling tells me, and what I believe to be true, is that the vast majority of the American people are behind us not to give in to Trump or the Republicans.”
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said he believed Democrats should continue to fight until they get an agreement to extend the subsidies. He predicted that the results of Tuesday’s off-year elections would confirm that “the American people want us to fight for them.”
The hardliners are still demanding some kind of guarantee that Republicans will rescue Obamacare funding for them. But the most they are likely to get in a coming deal is a commitment to hold a vote. They will almost certainly lose that vote but will then be able to use it as an issue in midterms.
And let's face it, that's all this stunt was ever about. Democrats were not doing well in the polls and wanted some way to rally the troops with a big show of Trump resistance. The fact that this was never going to get anything done didn't matter. It was all about the willingness to fight and appease their angry base. So far it doesn't seem to have accomplished any of their goals.
Even if a few moderate Democrats appear ready to step back from the shutdown, there's another problem. The current CR being held up in the Senate was only intended to keep the government open until Nov. 21. So, at best, if Democrats cave this week, you're getting about two weeks of funding before we potentially have to do this all over again. Democrats are demanding a new CR that will keep the government open until late December, but Republicans in the House are pushing back on that idea.
House Majority Leader Steve Scalise confirmed Wednesday that a longer stopgap is under consideration, but he insisted it wouldn’t jam lawmakers up against a holiday deadline. His comments come after GOP hard-liners warned privately that they will not accept a December deadline, preferring April or later.
“Democrats love the Christmas Eve, you know, omnibus bad deal. We’re not going to do that,” Scalise told reporters Wednesday.
Sen. Rick Scott seconded that.
Democrats shut down the government because they hate President Trump and want to waste more of YOUR dollars after putting the nation on the path for an unsustainable $38 trillion in debt. Any new continuing resolution must extend past January 15 to avoid a Christmas omnibus…
— Rick Scott (@SenRickScott) November 3, 2025
Any new continuing resolution must extend past January 15 to avoid a Christmas omnibus loaded with earmarks. My friends in the House want to extend a CR at least until March 31. Any spending bills we eventually pass should be closely aligned with the president’s proposed budget to deliver for the American people and bring fiscal sanity back to the nation.
Suggestions for a new extension range from next March/April all the way out to next December. But the longer timelines also seem unlikely as they would lock in 2024 spending for another year.
So the bottom line is that Democrats are looking to cave pretty soon, probably right after the elections today if things go well for them. Expect to see a lot more talk about opening the government tomorrow. You'll know it's happening the moment we hear similar talking points about what a triumph this whole thing has been echoing on social media.
