With no end in sight to the government shutdown, the Senate rejected the House passed funding patch for the eighth time on Thursday.
The chamber almost guarantees that the funding breach will reach the three week threshold at midnight on Tuesday as it does not anticipate holding another legislative session until Monday.
According to Politico, Democratic senators did not appear to be breaking rank and voting in favor of the GOP led stopgap, and Senate Majority Leader John Thune persisted in pressuring votes on it.
In an effort to push the legislation that would fund the government until November 21, the same Democrats who had been voting against it in recent days continued to cast "no" votes on Thursday.
Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Senator Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada, and independent Senator Angus King of Maine, who caucuses with Democrats, all voted once more in favor of the Republican led stopgap.
But this week, a new factor surfaced that might help break the impasse: Thune wants to start a floor discussion on individual spending bills that would finance federal agencies for a full year, beginning with the Pentagon and perhaps also the departments of Education, Labor, and Health and Human Services. The expense to the government would rise as the shutdown period dragged on.
The US economy may suffer greatly as a result of the current government shutdown, Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent cautioned.
Bessent stated during a press conference that the partial closure, which is already in its third week, is "beginning to cut into muscle here."
The Treasury later clarified that he meant $15 billion each week, but at first he said the closure might cost the economy up to $15 billion per day. Fox Business reports that the shutdown started on October 1st when the White House and Congress were unable to enact a fiscal year 2026 funding package.
In defiance of party leadership, Bessent called on moderate Senate Democrats to "be heroes" and back the Senate Republicans' ongoing resolution to restore the government for Americans.
Though they are still primarily informal exercises, discussions between Republicans and Democrats have started to wane as neither party is prepared to budge from their firmly held beliefs.
According to a recent AP NORC poll, Americans consider it a significant issue and place blame on people of all political persuasions.
54% of respondents believe that congressional Democrats bear "quite a bit" or "a great deal" of responsibility, compared to almost 60% who believe that President Donald Trump and congressional Republicans bear "quite a lot."
According to AP News, at least 75% of Americans believe that each party is somewhat responsible, indicating a general sense of dissatisfaction.
Republicans refusal to talk without a budget measure and Democrats insistence to extend pandemic-era tax benefits have caused the deadlock to worsen.
Despite the fact that both sides seek to place blame on one another, the poll indicates that the public is marginally more irate with the ruling party, with half of Americans holding Trump primarily accountable. While pointing the finger at both sides, voters like Sophia Cole, a Republican from St. Louis, stress the president's role in negotiating a settlement.
54% of Americans say the shutdown is a "major issue," according to the poll, while only 11% say it is "not a problem at all." 69% of Democrats are inclined to view it as a serious issue, compared to 37% of Republicans and 59% of independents.
