Lisa Desjardins:
We have had another long, strange couple of days here on Capitol Hill, but I can report now from sources familiar that there is potentially a break in the impasse right now.
They need about eight Senate Democratic votes. This morning, it didn’t look like those votes were there, but now I can report that the Senate Democratic leader himself, Chuck Schumer, has told Democrats that he plans to vote yes on that critical 60-margin vote.
Now, with that, we expect other Democrats to come on board. This, of course, is the House measure that was passed, would fund government all the way until September 30. Democrats, by and large, do not like it because it would continue to allow Donald Trump and Elon Musk to cut government as they like.
There’s no guardrails in here, as Democrats would want. But, of course, Democrats don’t control either chamber. This is a real test for Chuck Schumer. It’s been unclear as Democrats were divided what to do how he would approach this. But now it looks like he’s trying to split the atom here, with most Democrats voting against this, he himself leading a few that could allow the government to stay open.
The only Democrat officially voting yes right now is John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. He is someone who has said openly the idea of Democrats pushing for a shutdown or allowing a shutdown is something that he thinks is beyond Democratic strategy and is something that would really hurt the country. So he is a yes.
And now we are reporting tonight that Senator Schumer will be a yes as well, likely opening up enough votes to get a spending bill through tomorrow.
