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Posted on 11/03/2025 6:58:58 AM PST by DFG
At least eight moderate Senate Democrats are meeting in hopes of finding a deal to end the monthlong government shutdown, but sources familiar with the closely held conversations say they will need strong assurances from the GOP before voting to reopen the government.
The eight Democrats, who include Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.) and Jon Ossoff (Ga.), the latter a top Republican target in 2026, will need to feel comfortable with whatever is offered by Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.), and they may need to hear from President Trump himself, sources told The Hill.
The group huddled in the Capitol basement during votes Thursday in an attempt to put themselves in a position to end the shutdown before the scheduled Veterans Day recess.
“Bipartisan conversations are continuing and that’s a good sign,” Ossoff told The Hill.
Asked how optimistic he was of reaching a deal this week, Ossoff, who voted earlier this month to pay essential federal workers during the shutdown, said, “We need a resolution that does right by our constituents.”
“My constituents don’t want their health insurance premiums to skyrocket, they want the government reopened,” he said. “It’s good that bipartisan conversations are continuing.”
The senators viewed as most likely to vote for a clean continuing resolution to reopen the government are Shaheen, Ossoff and Sens. Gary Peters (D-Mich.), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), Peter Welch (D-Vt.), Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Elissa Slotkin (D-Mich.).
The eight lawmakers were spotted emerging from a meeting in a Capitol hideaway Thursday before the Senate adjourned for the week, and some of them, including Shaheen and Kelly, said they wanted the chamber to stay in session over the weekend to get the deal done.
Along with Sens. John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Angus King (I-Maine), they would be able to provide more than enough votes to reopen federal departments and agencies this week.
Fetterman, Cortez Masto and King have voted repeatedly for a House-passed bill to fund the government through Nov. 21.
A Democratic senator who requested anonymity to comment on the prospect of a deal this week said that Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (N.Y.) is eager to end the shutdown after funding for Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) benefits expired and the open enrollment period of the Affordable Care Act health insurance marketplace started on Nov. 1.
“They don’t want to go through another week with federal employees not getting paid and the food banks being shut off,” said the Democratic lawmaker, referring to Democratic colleagues who are eager to reopen the government later this week.
The senator said that Schumer, who is under intense pressure from the party’s liberal base not to capitulate to Republicans, won’t vote for the House-passed bill to reopen the government. but he’s not going to crack down on moderate colleagues who change their positions and vote for it.
“It’s not going to provoke a war, it’s the way it works around here,” the senator said of the prospect of a group of centrist Democrats breaking with Schumer and members of his leadership team voting with Republicans to reopen the government.
The expiration of SNAP benefits on Nov. 1 is a major source of concern for wavering Democratic senators who are looking for a face-saving reason to reopen the government.
Fetterman, who has voted repeatedly for the House-passed funding bill, said allowing nearly 42 million Americans to miss food assistance would be a “betrayal” of Democratic values.
He said the lapse in SNAP benefits impacts 2 million people in Pennsylvania.
“I don’t have an answer for them. I’m apologizing to people. It’s an absolute failure,” he said.
He asked what is going to happen to mothers with “two or three kids” to feed when their Electronic Benefit Transfer cards are empty.
“We are brutalizing at that point and it’s despicable,” he said. “I am deeply frustrated.”
Fetterman said many of his Democratic colleagues are “afraid” of the Democratic Party’s liberal base.
“The difference between me and them is they are afraid of the base and I am not,” he said. “If it’s wrong for a Democrat to say, ‘Feed 2 million people in my state.’ SNAP recipients, that’s the core, core, core part of our base. These are the kind of people we really fight for. It’s a fundamental betrayal of our values.”
Sen. Ruben Gallego (D-Ariz.) asked for unanimous consent on the Senate floor last week to pass a bill to fund SNAP and the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants and Children (WIC) during the shutdown, but Thune objected.
Thune accused Democrats of trying to turn federal funding of SNAP and WIC into a “political game.”
Sources familiar with the talks say the conversations remain highly “sensitive” and caution there needs to be a concrete assurance from Thune that Trump and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) would seriously consider any proposal to extend enhanced health insurance subsidies that passes the Senate.
Thune has promised Democrats they will get a vote on any bill they want to put on the Senate floor to extend enhanced health insurance subsidies under the Affordable Care Act that are due to expire in January.
He has also pledged that Trump is ready to negotiate with Democrats on reducing health care costs as soon as the government is open again.
“The president does like to negotiate and I don’t know where that would lead. I can’t predict that. That’s what I told the Democrats here, that I can’t guarantee an outcome or result,” Thune said Thursday afternoon.
“What I can promise them is a process. They would get their vote and they can have their vote by a date certain, which … initially, at least, a lot of them were asking for,” he said.
Moderate Democrats are weighing whether Thune can help them deliver a bill to keep health insurance premiums in check that can pass the House and secure Trump’s signature.
Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), a prominent centrist who is up for reelection next year, said he’s skeptical of any deal with Republicans that doesn’t have Trump’s blessing.
“I have a concern that so many of my Republican friends, who I know are concerned about the government being shut down, health care costs, the SNAP benefits — I do worry … whether they are willing to make that deal with the president’s sign-off,” he said.
“Unlike in the past, we probably got to get the president deeply engaged,” he said. “It goes back to trust.”
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Kabuki theater, of course. Shumer has green lighted these “moderates” so the dems can get out of the corner they have pained themselves into
Hey, “DNC Al” Bolton - the Democommies are trying to get their nutters to turn out for the “election”...
Just waiting for election day to be over.
No deal.
Surrender or we nuke filibuster.
Its that simple.
********
Nuke the fillibuster now without waiting for the prisoners to surrender.
“SNAP recipients, that’s the core, core, core part of our base. These are the kind of people we really fight for. It’s a fundamental betrayal of our values.”
Fetterman!
If the Democrat party wasn’t motivated to avoid an interruption of SNAP money used by so many people in this country, that cohort of people cannot possibly be “the core, core, core” of your base.
Those people are now waking up, in their millions, to realize that the Democrat Party demonically hates them, just as it hates all other groups, and subgroups, of actual flesh and blood Americans.
There are no moderate dims. They all advocate for the murder of the unborn child.
I hope the Republicans are considering their own health care reform. They could consult with conservative groups who have good ideas like Association of American Physicians and Surgeons.
I am tired of the pork non-sense.
They gave Obamacare plenty of money and had a decade plus to make it work. It failed. The system was supposed to be self supporting by now, and the subsidies were supposed to sundown. Let the subsidies for Obamacare go, let the free market decide. Obamacare is just driving up health care costs for everybody.
As far as the Medicaid subsidies for foreigners (paroles) and Illegals, the answer is a firm not just no, but hell no. States can do what they want from taxing their citizens, but the Federal government needs to get out of the Medicaid business.
I would rather the government stay ‘shut down’ than continue deficit spending for horrible Biden era policies that hurt Americans and Social Security and Medicare by diverting money to ‘illegals’ and ‘parolees’.
Hell, the period of time the pending CR is supposed to cover ends this month. Why give up anything but a symbolic pittance to obtain the necessary Senate votes, when it looks like a new CR will apparently be needed in just a few short weeks?
(N.B.: Will revise and extend remarks if Regular Order returns post haste, depositing the nearly 25-year regime of government-funding CRs into the ashbin of history.)
Passing a clean CR would appear to give Republicans, and Trump, a win.
I seriously doubt Mark Kelly is going to vote for that. Never.
And abolish the filibuster.
"Do unto others - before they do unto you."
nbcnews.com
By Ryan J. Reilly and Natasha Korecki
DOJ indicts Democratic congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh over ICE protests
Abughazaleh called the charges “yet another attempt by the Trump administration to criminalize protest and punish those who dare to speak up.”
pic——Democratic congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh holds a megaphone outside the Broadview ICE processing facility in Broadview, Ill. She was indicted in connection with the protests.Jim Vondruska / Reuters
A special federal grand jury has indicted Democratic congressional candidate Kat Abughazaleh alongside other protesters who allegedly blocked vehicles outside of a federal immigration facility in Broadview, Illinois. The indictment, which was filed Oct. 23, alleges that Abughazaleh “physically hindered and impeded” an agent who was “forced to drive at an extremely slow rate of speed to avoid injuring any of the conspirators.” Abughazaleh was charged alongside five other people, including two other political candidates. She faces one count of conspiracy along with one charge alleging that she “forcibly impeded, intimidated, and interfered” with an officer.
The indictment alleges that the group “conspired with one another and others, known and unknown, to prevent by force, intimidation, and threat, Agent A, a United States law enforcement officer, from discharging the duties of his office, and to injure him in his person or property on account of his lawful discharge of the duties of his office, and while engaged in the lawful discharge thereof, and to injure his property so as to interrupt, hinder, and impede him in the discharge of his official duties.”
The defendants were not arrested but were notified of the indictment and will self-surrender next Wednesday, according to a court filing. U.S. District Judge April M. Perry, a Biden appointee, is assigned to the case. “This is a political prosecution that tries to turn dissent and First Amendment opposition to the Trump administration’s cruel policies into a conspiracy,” defense attorney Josh Herman told NBC News in an email. “
snip
Exactly. Senator Kennedy said a couple of weeks ago that Schumer would go to 6-8 of his close colleagues and get them to vote with the Republicans to get him out of this mess.
Not really. They are too dumb to understand the budget is not under Trump’s powers. They will never understand this comes straight from the demonrats they keep putting into office.
Those 2-3 kids are more like 6-8 kids and their mama’s refuse to name their daddies so they can get their hair and nails “did” and their grocery carts full of steak, lobster and junk food. The kids aren’t going to starve. Not with WIC from day 1 and free daycare (why?) with free bottles and diapers until they’re 4. At 4 and up, they get free school breakfasts, free lunches and snacks and free weekend food through the Backpack Program and in the summer ages 0-21 get free lunches. Then there are the food pantries, churches and other charities. Guess what! None of that food is deducted from their SNAP. That is double, triple, quadruple dipping.
59% of immigrants, legal or NOT, are on welfare. They all need to be packed off to North Korea.
No proposed bill should ever be over 1 8x11” page, New Times Roman 14 pt., double spaced, 1” border all around and 1 page only. If there is any pork in it, out it goes and it can’t be brought back for 6 months, period, the end.
Here’s a good deal to offer:
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