Government Shutdown Drags On With Little Pressure to Break Impasse
Pain from missed federal paychecks and healthcare deadlines will mount throughout October, but Republicans and Democrats aren’t budging for now.
WASHINGTON—The federal government shutdown is dragging toward its second week in a partisan staring contest, lacking for now the political or practical consequences that would create enough pressure to break the impasse.
All signs point to another week of posturing and repeat Senate votes that fail to get the 60 votes needed to reopen the government. Congressional leaders in both parties insist that they have the upper hand and that the other side bears the blame for the shutdown.
“Right now, we’re at a stalemate,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R., S.D.) said on Fox’s “Sunday Morning Futures,” urging Democrats to buck their party’s leaders. “They’ll get another chance on Monday to vote again, and I’m hoping that some of them have a change of heart.”
Even if the two sides make progress on negotiating a deal, President Trump’s approval is necessary to end the shutdown, and he has preferred mocking Democrats on social media to engaging with them in the standoff’s first five days.
The White House has already paused funding for transportation and energy projects in Democratic-majority states, and Trump holds at least one potential escalation in reserve—firing federal workers. If the president determines negotiations are going nowhere, he will begin layoffs, White House economic adviser Kevin Hassett said on CNN’s “State of the Union” Sunday.
Shutdowns don’t require layoffs, and two labor unions have already filed a legal challenge to the possible mass firings. Legal scholars have questioned the legality of firing federal workers during a shutdown.
Sen. Andy Kim (D., N.J.) said trust issues are making it hard for Democrats to reach a deal. Even if they can come to agreement with Republicans on the Hill, they don’t trust the Trump administration to honor it.
“Look, we have been saying: if a deal is made it has to be a deal,” Kim said. “And we can’t have a situation where Trump can come back and say, ‘Oh actually no, I’m not going to follow through on those subsidies’” for the Affordable Care Act, or punish blue states with more funding freezes.
The shutdown will likely cause pain, but the early days don’t bring enough acute anguish to make anyone budge. Funding for most of the federal government lapsed after the fiscal year ended Sept. 30. The House-passed bill to extend current funding levels into mid-November remains stalled in the Senate. House members left Washington Sept. 19 and haven’t returned; Speaker Mike Johnson (R., La.) canceled this week’s session, saying the Senate must accept the House bill.
The shutdown’s impact has been relatively muted for now. Because of the funding lapse, hundreds of thousands of federal workers have been furloughed and others are working without pay. The Bureau of Labor Statistics didn’t release the monthly jobs report on its usual schedule. Some government-funded facilities, including the National Arboretum and National Gallery of Art in Washington, closed to the public. Other government functions, such as Social Security benefit payments, continue without interruption.
A sign outside the National Gallery of Art in Washington during the first days of the federal government shutdown.
Pressure will build over time. By the middle of October, federal workers, including members of the military, will start missing paychecks. That will start weighing on consumer spending and economic growth and bring more frustrated phone calls to lawmakers’ offices. Disruptions that affect broad groups of Americans, such as air travelers, could hasten an end to the deadlock.
A 2013 shutdown lasted more than two weeks and ended as the country neared a debt-ceiling deadline that isn’t present this time. In 2019, after more than a month, and fallout including flight delays caused by unpaid security agents and air-traffic controllers, Trump ended a shutdown when he relented on his demand for border-wall funding.
Democrats are in the Senate minority and control just 47 of 100 seats, but the chamber’s filibuster rules give them leverage in the unified Republican government. Party leaders are determined to use it now after agreeing to a funding extension earlier this year.
They say they see political momentum shifting their way as November nears. That is the beginning of the annual open enrollment period for health insurance under the Affordable Care Act. Enhanced subsidies enacted under President Joe Biden are expiring, and analysts expect premiums to rise sharply if Congress doesn’t act.
Democrats want to tie an extension of the subsidies to government funding. Republicans say they are willing to negotiate on that issue—but only after Democrats vote to reopen the government.
Rep. Andy Harris (R., Md.), chairman of the House Freedom Caucus, said the mass firings would accelerate a conclusion to the shutdown because any fired federal workers who were brought back onto payrolls would be ineligible for the back pay that furloughed employees receive.
“That’ll put further pressure on the Democrats to get realistic about this,” Harris said.
Unilateral administration moves such as layoffs could also antagonize Democrats, who are wary of making spending deals with Trump that the administration just ignores.
The likeliest path out of the shutdown is some sort of deal on the healthcare subsidies.
Thune reiterated Sunday that he won’t negotiate healthcare details until the government reopens, but he also said there are bipartisan conversations happening and suggested that Republicans couldn’t accept an extension without structural policy changes. Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D., N.H.), who is seen as pivotal to any deal, has been making calls over the weekend to seek a path forward, according to a person who has spoken with her.
Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, a Democrat from New Hampshire, is seen as a key figure in reaching a deal.
Republicans are split on the subsidies, many of which go to people in states that Trump won in 2024 that haven’t expanded Medicaid and thus have more people on the Obamacare insurance exchanges. Some Republicans say the subsidies are too generous and shouldn’t be made permanent. Finding a solution that satisfies House conservatives and still attracts Senate Democrats will be challenging.
“You make a deal with John Thune, but if it doesn’t go anywhere in the House, you really don’t have anything,” said Sen. Angus King of Maine, an independent who caucuses with Democrats and has voted to advance the GOP bill.
Johnson continued to describe the health-insurance subsidies as an end-of-year issue, because they technically expire Dec. 31. But open enrollment for 2026 insurance happens in November.
All healthcare details don’t need to be resolved to end the shutdown, said James Lucier, a managing director at research firm Capital Alpha Partners.
“Republicans are realizing that they’ll probably have to do something but they are waiting for guidance from Trump,” he said.
The president hasn’t offered a clear stance. Behind the scenes, his team is increasingly concerned that allowing the subsidies to lapse will create political vulnerabilities for Republicans.
“Obamacare has been a disaster for the people, so we want to have it fixed so it works,” Trump said Sunday.
Write to Richard Rubin at richard.rubin@wsj.com and Siobhan Hughes at Siobhan.hughes@wsj.com
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