It’s official. The government shutdown is the longest ever
It’s official: The government shutdown has become the longest in U.S. history, marking 36 painful days of missed paychecks, travel disruptions, food shortages and other mounting consequences for millions of Americans.
Before and after the milestone approached, the political gridlock that has defined much of the month-long crisis in Washington showed some signs of abating, particularly following big election wins for Democrats on Tuesday night in major off-year races in New York, New Jersey and Virginia.
Democrats broadly characterized their victories as rebukes of President Donald Trump’s agenda, while Republicans criticized their opponents for dragging out the shutdown to avoid losing progressive voters.
Whether those wins will embolden Democrats to hold firm in their shutdown stances, or motivate them to end it, isn’t clear.
As voters were heading to the polls Tuesday, senators shot down a short-term funding measure for the 14th time. Still, rank-and-file lawmakers in Congress have said in recent days that bipartisan back-channeling is picking up, and they’re getting closer to a potential agreement to persuade moderate Senate Democrats to break ranks.
“We’re hoping this will be the week when the Democrats come to their senses and decide to reopen the government,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-South Dakota, told reporters Tuesday.
In exchange for reopening the government, Republicans have promised Democrats a Senate vote, which would likely fail, on extending Obamacare subsidies, which have been central to the shutdown debate. Progressive lawmakers have said that offer isn’t enough, though moderates seem warmer to the notion.
Senate Democrats met for several hours on Capitol Hill Tuesday to discuss their shutdown off-ramp options. Their leader, Chuck Schumer, D-New York, didn’t elaborate on where exactly his members landed.
“We’re exploring all the options,” he said.
‘When you cave, you lose’: Sanders pleads with Dems to hold firm on shutdown
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, pleaded with his Democratic colleagues in the Senate to hold firm on their shutdown demands after Tuesday night’s election results.
The wins, he said, were proof that voters want Democrats to play hardball, including by forcing Republicans to commit to extending the expiring health care subsidies at the center of the shutdown debacle.
“The Democrats now are winning because they’re standing with working people,” Sanders said. “When you cave, you lose.”
His comments underlined how Democrats’ sweeping victories are already influencing the party’s position on the shutdown, even as more moderate lawmakers engage in bipartisan discussions to potentially bring the crisis to an end.
“We’ve come this far,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut. “The American people seem to be on our side. We really owe it to them to stand firm at this point and say we need a commitment to extend the health care premium subsidies.”
GOP split on impact of Democrats’ election wins
On the heels of big election wins for Democrats Tuesday night, Republicans even at the highest leadership levels appeared split the next day as to whether they should downplay the results – or take them as troubling indicators for their party.
Several GOP lawmakers, including House Speaker Mike Johnson, stressed that Democrats were expected to come out on top.
“We knew in advance that they were going to take a victory lap,” said Sen. Mike Rounds, R-South Dakota. The races were ones “we did not expect to win anyways,” said Sen. John Kennedy, R-Louisiana.
Other Republicans, including President Trump, seemed to think the results underscored bigger problems.
“Last night, if that wasn’t a message to all Republicans, then we’ve got our heads jammed in the ground,” said Sen. Jim Justice, R-West Virginia.
“The lesson is that we’ve got to deliver on the campaign promises we made,” said Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri.
Trump’s push to end the filibuster divides Republicans
Despite the president’s pleas Wednesday to end the filibuster, many Senate Republicans remained unwavering in their support for the 60-vote threshold, which they say incentivizes bipartisanship and will protect the country when Democrats regain power in the future.
“We killed a lot of President Biden’s goofy ideas through the filibuster,” said Sen. John Kennedy, R-Louisiana. “And someday the shoe will be on the other foot.”
Still, notable defections began to emerge after GOP lawmakers met with Trump at the White House for breakfast. Sen. John Cornyn, a Texas Republican who’s up for reelection next year and is still waiting on an endorsement from the president, indicated he could be open to nixing the rule, specifically for budget bills.
“Having a willful minority being able to shutdown the government any time they want to, obviously we can’t tolerate that,” he said. “I think that calls for some changes.”
Schumer calls on Trump, GOP to negotiate shutdown following election results
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, urged President Donald Trump and Republican lawmakers to meet with Democrats to end the government shutdown following his party’s sweeping wins on Tuesday.
“The election shows that Democrats’ control of the Senate is much closer than the people and the prognosticators realize,” Schumer said. “The more Republicans double down on raising costs and bowing down to Trump, the more their Senate majority is at risk.”
Schumer said he and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries warned Trump at the White House a couple of months ago that if a deal is not made to end the shutdown and address their health care concerns that it was going to be bad for them come the elections.
“Last night should make it clear to Republicans that they simply cannot continue to ignore not only us, but the American people, for the good of the whole country,” Schumer said.
Amid longest shutdown, Johnson tries to shrug off Democratic election victories
As the government shutdown became the longest in history on Wednesday, House Speaker Mike Johnson addressed Democrats’ victories in key elections in Virginia, New Jersey, California and New York.
Johnson argued that Americans shouldn’t “read too much into” Tuesday night’s election results.
“What happened last night was blue states and blue cities voted blue,” Johnson said at his daily press conference at the U.S. Capitol. “We all saw that coming, and no one should read too much into last night’s election results. Off year, elections are not indicative of what’s to come.”
Johnson specifically criticized Zohran Mamdani, the 34-year-old democratic socialist who won the New York City mayoral race. He said that Mamdani is a bellwether in how House Democrats, some of whom represent more moderate districts than New York City, “have embraced him with open arms.”
Going into the 2026 midterm election, Johnson said Republicans are going to be “bullish” on their record.
Johnson calls shutdown milestone ‘a sad landmark’
House Speaker Mike Johnson said Wednesday marked “a sad landmark in our history” after the government shutdown became the longest in history.
“Unlike our Democrat friends, Republicans know there’s no prize for the milestone we’ve hit today,” Johnson said. “No one wins in a government shutdown.”
Johnson urged Democrats to pass the short-term funding bill that would reopen the government until Nov. 21.
Jeffries says he hopes GOP sees ‘need to change course’ in shutdown
Following sweeping victories in elections across the countries for Democrats, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-New York, on Wednesday morning said he hopes Republican lawmakers change course to try and end the now 36-day government shutdown.
Jeffries said in an interview with MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” that Democrats want to find a bipartisan path forward to the government shutdown, which is now the longest in U.S. history, that addresses high costs in America, including health care.
“We repeatedly maintain as Democrats that we will sit down with anyone, anytime, any place,” Jeffries said in the interview that comes as Trump is meeting with GOP lawmakers at the White House. “Either on Capitol Hill or back at the White House in order to do what is necessary to end this Trump-Republican shutdown.”
Jeffries said that Republicans are taking a “‘my way or the highway’ approach,” a move they did when they passed Trump’s so-called Big Beautiful Bill, a massive tax and spending legislation that was enacted into law earlier this year.
“The American people are rejecting that level of extremism, and it’s certainly our hope that Republicans will see the need to change course,” the House Minority Leader said. “Sit down with us as Democrats and we can find our way out of this, unfortunately, very painful shutdown that the American people have been experiencing.”
Trump urges Senate GOP to eliminate filibuster
Trump urged Senate Republicans to abolish the filibuster, which allows a minority of lawmakers to block legislation including a bill to reopen the government, during a White House breakfast.
“The first thing we should do this afternoon is terminate the filibuster,” Trump said. “It’s horrible.”
The filibuster is a Senate rule that requires 60 of the 100 members to agree to advance legislation. With 53 Republicans and 47 lawmakers who caucus with Democrats, the rule requires a bipartisan vote on contentious legislation.
Trump said Republicans should approve their own legislation without Democrats, such as prohibiting mail-in voting and requiring voter identification at the polls.
But he acknowledged that half of Senate Republicans oppose getting rid of the filibuster. He argued that Democrats will end the filibuster if they regain control of the chamber.
“We’re going to talk about that a little bit,” Trump said. “We’re going to see if we can sway.”
Trump also blasted a “blue slip” tradition, which is basically an extension of the filibuster that allows senators to block presidential nominees in their own states, such as U.S. attorneys.
“The blue slips are a total disaster,” Trump said. “I think we’re going to court on it.”
Trump invites Republican senators to White House breakfast amid push to eliminate filibuster
Trump invited all GOP senators to the White House on Wednesday morning for breakfast.
It comes as he has urged them as recently as Tuesday night to vote to eliminate the filibuster to reopen the government, which would allow for a simple majority, rather than 60 votes, to pass significant legislation in the Senate.
Trump’s efforts, however, have been met by resistance from some Republican senators, including Thune, who said Tuesday “the votes aren’t there” to get rid of it.
Both Republicans and Democrats have emphasized the importance of the filibuster in recent days as a necessary threshold to maintain bipartisanship in Congress. Doing away with it would significantly damage already-frayed interparty relations.
Trump oversaw the two longest shutdowns in US history. Here’s how they compare.
The Senate failed on its 14th and latest vote to end the government shutdown on Tuesday, positioning it to exceed the stand-alone 35 day record set during Trump’s first term in 2019.
Trump’s combined shutdowns have already eclipsed the collective record of 56 days, which took place over five shutdowns in three years, during President Jimmy Carter’s administration.
Thune says lawmakers are discussing new short-term funding deadline
Thune said Tuesday the Senate will soon change the Nov. 21 deadline for a short-term spending bill to reopen the government.
Thune said lawmakers are still discussing the best date to give lawmakers time to approve full-year spending bills. Options include a spending extension into early 2026. But Thune said “nobody” wants to keep the same spending levels for an entire fiscal year.
If lawmakers in both chambers agree to a date, the Senate could vote on it and then send it back to the House, which has been recessed for more than a month, for ratification.
“There is a conversation about what the next deadline should be,” Thune said. “The date is something that is still being discussed.”