Democrats wrestle with shutdown strategy

Democrats on Capitol Hill are furious with the Trump administration and their Republican counterparts for undercutting government funding negotiations, but they aren't showing a unified strategy for forcing the GOP to change course 10 weeks out from a shutdown deadline.

In the House, Republicans are ignoring Democratic priorities in government funding bills, moving forward with deep spending cuts and conservative policy riders — including to restrict abortions, block enforcement of a slew of gun regulations and snuff out federal hiring efforts to promote diversity, equity and inclusion.

In the Senate, Democrats have more leverage, where 60 votes will be needed to move forward and GOP leaders are already advancing funding bills with buy-in from across the aisle. But so far Democrats are stopping short of flashing the most powerful tool they have to ensure the end result is to their liking: threatening a shutdown come Oct. 1 if they don’t get their way.

Democrats can shame administration officials who are openly dismissing the need for bipartisanship in funding talks — and the Republicans backing them up. Yet Democrats have little power to ensure they get to shape whatever legislation Congress passes to keep federal cash flowing beyond September, or stop President Donald Trump from freezing, canceling and now clawing back funding Congress already approved.

“To be blunt, I don't think there's one tactic or approach that is going to solve this from any individual Democrat,” Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), a top appropriator, said in an interview. “The Republicans have to decide whether they want to be totally lobotomized or not.”

The dynamic underscores the bind that Democrats could find themselves in once again, after Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer took intense heat from across his party for helping pave the way for passage of Republicans’ government funding extension in March. And despite pressure to play hardball, Democrats at this moment are still searching for leverage.

“They’re just throwing stuff against the wall because they’re losing this fight,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) said in an interview.

Democrats are talking openly about how they have few options for stopping Trump or his allies in Congress from driving all major government funding decisions and undermining the cash lawmakers already appropriated on a bipartisan basis. Since Senate Democrats went along with the March continuing resolution, Trump has continued to unilaterally slash broad swaths of the federal bureaucracy.

Last week, he successfully pushed Hill Republicans to approve $9 billion in funding clawbacks for foreign aid and local media — the first time Congress has approved a rescissions package in 30 years.

Some Republicans are sympathetic to the Democratic position that Trump and his White House budget chief, Russ Vought, are running roughshod over Congress’ “power of the purse” and should be challenged.

Two GOP senators — Appropriations Chair Susan Collins of Maine and another senior appropriator, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski — voted against Trump’s rescissions package. Several more voted “yes” but still spoke critically of the Trump administration’s unwillingness to detail specific accounts that will be cut, as well as the chilling effect the Republican clawbacks could have on bipartisan funding negotiations.

After Vought told reporters Thursday that “the appropriations process has to be less bipartisan,” Collins urged fellow appropriators that "the best way for us to counter what has been said by the OMB director is to continue to work in a bipartisan way. And I hope that we are going to do so.”

But Democrats need more than just Collins to come to the defense of Congress’ funding prerogative.

“We've got to work to make sure that there are several others on the other side of the aisle who have the stomach and the strength and the spine to stand up and say: ‘No, don't take it away from the Congress. It's our job,’” Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the House’s top Democratic appropriator, told reporters Thursday night before the House passed the package to nix $9 billion.

Democrats also need to help boost the legal fights against Trump’s funding moves, DeLauro added, as more than 100 of those lawsuits play out in courtrooms throughout the country.

As Democrats hope for a critical mass of Republicans willing to defy Trump, some are testing out a more hardline position of warning Republicans they could have to go at it alone in a funding fight this fall. In a joint statement after House Republicans cleared Trump’s recessions package just after midnight Friday, the House’s top three Democrats fired off a warning shot that pinned the onus on Republicans to avoid a funding lapse in the coming months.

“Tonight’s vote, coming hours after the Trump White House abandoned the bipartisan appropriations process, makes it clear that House Republicans are determined to march this country toward a painful government shutdown later this year,” said Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, Minority Whip Kathrine Clark and Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar.

And Schumer said in a letter to his caucus earlier this month that Republicans “know it is absurd” to count on Democrats supporting the pursuit of fiscal 2026 funding bills if the GOP votes along party lines to delete existing funding or pile on more cash. That’s what Republicans did in boosting military and border security budgets through their tax and spending megabill Trump signed on July 4.

But Schumer also stopped short of delivering a clear threat ahead of the September shutdown deadline. And Democrats aren’t yet willing to give up on funding negotiations with their GOP colleagues, even after Republicans ignored their warnings about eroding trust in bipartisan talks by backing the clawbacks package last week.

In fact, Democratic appropriators are largely leaning in, especially in the Senate, where GOP leaders plan to bring bipartisan funding measures to the floor as soon as this week.

“I think the most important thing for us to do is to continue to move the appropriations process as expeditiously as we can, to try and find bipartisan agreement,” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), a top appropriator, said in an interview, “because it’s in everybody's interest to do this and to move forward.”

Cassandra Dumay and Calen Razor contributed to this report.