Schumer backs off opposition to GOP budget plan as shutdown looms

WASHINGTON (CN) — With just a day to go before a government funding deadline, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer backed away from his commitment to fight Republicans on a spending resolution Democrats have derided for days as a gift to President Donald Trump.

The congressional scrap over the GOP’s continuing resolution, drafted without Democratic input, has pitched fears about a government shutdown — which could begin if lawmakers fail to pass any sort of stopgap budget before midnight on Friday.

But Schumer, after earlier this week suggesting Democrats would filibuster the measure, announced on the Senate floor that he would not vote for the continuing resolution.

“While the CR bill is very bad, the potential for a shutdown has consequences for America that are much, much worse,” he said.

The GOP legislation is “deeply partisan,” Schumer added, but argued that Trump would use a government shutdown to “take even more power.”

While the Democratic leader’s announcement does not guarantee that Republicans can secure the bipartisan votes it needs to pass its proposed budget patch, it relieves some of the uncertainty which had members of Congress from both sides of the aisle preemptively blaming each other for the potential consequences of barreling over the fiscal cliff.

Senate Democrats, many of whom said publicly on Thursday that they would not approve a procedural measure to bring the Republican continuing resolution up for a vote, have slammed the proposed legislation, which would not only extend funding for most federal programs through September but also implement a swath of budget cuts for line items such as rent subsidies and veterans’ assistance.

Lawmakers have argued that the extended stopgap also hands the Trump administration broad purchase to set policy and claw back further spending otherwise left to Congress.

In a video message posted to X Thursday, Connecticut Senator Richard Blumenthal contended that the proposed continuing resolution effectively creates a “personal slush fund” for the president by ceding him “unwarranted, unbridled, broad authority.”

“Republicans decided to barrel forward with this partisan, strictly Republican measure without any attempt at bipartisan lawmaking or negotiation,” Blumenthal added. “The only power I have in this process, the only way I can participate, is to vote.”

In a joint statement Thursday, New Mexico’s Senate delegation wrote that while they wanted to keep the federal government open, they would not allow Republicans to ram through a continuing resolution that they posed as a “power grab masquerading as a funding bill.”

“Donald Trump and Elon Musk have already grossly abused their power,” wrote Senator Martin Heinrich and Senator Ben Ray Lujan. “Now Republicans want to pass a yearlong Continuing Resolution that gives Trump and Musk even more tools to harm our communities.”

Some of the Senate’s more moderate Democrats have also come out against the GOP funding resolution. Senator Mark Kelly and Senator Ruben Gallego, both from Arizona, have said that they would vote against the measure.

But at least one Democrat — Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman — broke with his colleagues Thursday, telling reporters he did not want to see the government shut down.

Republicans would need to flip at least eight Democrats to have any hope of passing their proposed continuing resolution. Senate rules dictate that lawmakers cannot move ahead to a final vote on the measure until it passes a procedural hurdle known as cloture, which requires a 60-vote margin.

While Democrats placed the blame for a potential shutdown squarely at Republicans’ feet, GOP lawmakers have fired back that their colleagues need only get in line to meet the fiscal deadline.

West Virginia Senator Shelley Moore Capito shifted the onus onto Democrats, writing in a post on X Thursday that they could either “barrel us into a government shutdown” or choose “common sense” and support the Republican continuing resolution.

And, speaking on CNBC Thursday, Oklahoma Senator James Lankford argued that Republicans had been “very, very reasonable” in their approach to their budget patch.

“We’ve just said, keep it open at the same rate that we’re open — let’s get through the rest of this year on this,” he said. “No one’s trying to toy with anything on it. Let’s just keep it going status quo and then fight it out in September for the next year … and for whatever reason Democrats have just screamed and complained about that.”

In lieu of the GOP’s existing continuing resolution, Democrats had proposed a 30-day stopgap which would keep the government open until April 11 while lawmakers debate full year spending bills.

Even if the Senate were to agree to Democrats’ alternative, it would also need to be approved by the House, which left for recess earlier this week after it passed its version of the budget stopgap. It’s unclear that there would be enough time to bring lawmakers back to Washington — or that House Republicans would be willing to pass such a compromise on a voice vote — before Friday’s deadline.

The Senate is expected to hold a cloture vote on the proposed budget resolution Friday, with final passage scheduled for later on that day.

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