Dem
47
GOP
53
You may want to brace yourself for this, but: The federal government is still shut down. The Senate held its lucky thirteenth vote on the House's sorta-clean kick-the-can-down-the-road bill, and the measure failed to pass for the 13th time. As with the first 12 votes, Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), John Fetterman (D-PA) and Angus King (I-ME) voted with all of the Republicans, which means that the bill was five votes short of the 60 votes needed to invoke cloture. It also means that the pressure from the American Federation of Government Employees, whose president called for Democrats to support the House bill, had absolutely no effect.
We wrote an extremely long item about the shutdown yesterday, and do not need to subject readers to that kind of abuse for multiple days in a row. However, here are a few quick updates based on events in the past 24 hours:
SNAP: Yesterday, we wrote:
The Republican finger-pointing speaks to a certain amount of desperation, which implies that Trump & Co. know they are more likely than not to get the blame here. That said, we are surprised that the Democrats—as far as we know—have not introduced a bill to fund SNAP during the shutdown. It would not pass, presumably, but then the members of the blue team could say "We tried to fund SNAP, but the Republicans voted it down."Clearly, like Gov. Gavin Newsom (D-CA), the members of the Senate are readers of this blog, because there are now dueling SNAP bills, both of them announced yesterday. The one favored by the Republicans, with Sen. Josh Hawley (R-MO) leading the charge, would pay SNAP benefits while the government is shut down. The one favored by the Democrats, with Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) leading the charge, would pay SNAP benefits and WIC benefits while the government is shut down. SNAP benefits don't correlate with red states and blue states—for example, the five states with the highest percentage of the population getting SNAP, in order, are New Mexico (21%), Louisiana and Oregon (18%), Oklahoma (17%) and West Virginia (16%). WIC, which targets low-income women and their children, tends to go to urban areas (blue) and to people of color (also blue). This may explain the discrepancy between the two plans.
Of course, even if the Senate works something out, the House would have to come back in session and pass the bill. And then, Donald Trump would have to sign it. Neither of those are sure things, to say the least. And Speaker Mike Johnson would then have no excuse not to swear in Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-AZ), who would promptly sign the discharge petition, which would force a vote on the Epstein files.
Job Security: Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston extended her order barring the Trump administration from firing any federal employees while the shutdown is in effect. This will make it somewhat easier for the Democrats to accept the plan from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI), which would pay all federal workers during the shutdown, but would protect Trump's alleged right to fire who he wants. Obviously, the second part of that is moot, and figures to remain so for the duration of the shutdown.
GOP Dissension: It's nowhere near a majority yet, or even a large minority, but more Republican members of the House are expressing unhappiness with Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) for keeping the lower chamber in recess. The members who have spoken out publicly are Reps. Don Bacon (R-NE), Dan Crenshaw (R-TX), Kevin Kiley (R-CA) and Marjorie Taylor Greene. Reportedly, there are a few dozen others who feel similarly, but do not prefer to publicly chastise their party leader.
And that's the latest. Onward to Week 6! (Z)