The Senate on Friday rejected two competing efforts to reopen the government, all but assuring that the federal shutdown would drag through the weekend as Republicans and Democrats insisted they would not bend to the other’s demands to break their stalemate.
The votes on Friday were the fourth time in two weeks that Democrats blocked a House-passed G.O.P. plan to fund the government through Nov. 21, and that Republicans blocked Democrats’ bid to extend spending while adding more than $1 trillion for health care programs.
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota and the majority leader, then sent senators home for the weekend, saying his party would not bow to Democrats’ demands to tie a spending extension to health care concessions. That meant that unless some breakthrough occurred that appeared highly unlikely, the soonest another vote could take place to end the shutdown would be on Monday.
But on Day 3 of the shutdown, no such breakthrough appeared to be in the offing. Democrats were dug in, Republicans refused to negotiate with them, and the Trump administration was using the closure to push forward an ever-expanding campaign of funding cuts aimed at punishing Democrats for the impasse.
At the Capitol, Democrats opposed advancing the G.O.P. funding extension on a 54-to-44 vote, short of the 60 needed to move forward, with all but three of their members voting no. Republicans voted against taking up the Democratic plan, which would tie short-term government funding to an extension of expiring health care subsidies and the restoration of Medicaid cuts enacted as part of Republicans’ marquee tax cut law. The vote was 46 to 52, along party lines.
“This shutdown needs to end sooner rather than later,” Mr. Thune said on the Senate floor. “And there’s only one way out of it. Democrats need to vote for the clean, nonpartisan continuing resolution sitting right there. All it takes is one roll-call vote.”
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The post Senators Again Block Plans to Reopen Government as Shutdown Drags On appeared first on New York Times.
