Who has the upper hand in the shutdown?

IN THIS EDITION

Could Republicans botch this shutdown showdown?

Lawmakers dish at UN General Assembly

The Vault: Obamacare subsidies find GOP backing

ICYMI: Content to Commerce

THE TOP

Could Republicans botch this shutdown showdown?

Happy Wednesday morning.

Republicans have found themselves in an unusual position during the past week: having the unquestionable upper hand in a government-funding fight.

They could be squandering it.

A string of missteps has provided Democrats a boost in the back-and-forth battle over who would be responsible for a shutdown if federal agencies run out of money in seven days.

President Donald Trump Tuesday abruptly canceled a meeting with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, giving Democrats an opening to paint him as indifferent to finding the votes he needs to keep the government open.

House Democrats also are jumping on Speaker Mike Johnson’s decision to keep the House on recess beyond the start of a shutdown as proof that the GOP isn’t taking the crisis seriously.

Now let’s be clear: The facts surrounding this debate haven’t changed.

Hill Republicans and the White House want to pass a clean bill to fund the government until Nov. 21. The House passed the measure on a near party-line vote, but Senate Democrats blocked it.

Schumer and Jeffries have offered their own Oct. 31 CR that calls for permanent extension of Obamacare subsides, rolls back the huge Medicaid cuts in the One Big Beautiful Bill — Trump’s signature legislative win — and restricts the White House’s ability to rescind funding.

In short, Democrats have a set of audacious asks.

Instead of giving appropriators another seven weeks to make progress on the FY2026 spending bills, Democrats are instigating a fight now. And they have the power to do it, since Republicans need 60 votes in the Senate and the GOP is well short of that threshold.

Democrats have the political incentive to push hard. Since Schumer kept the government open in March in the name of stopping the White House from enacting harmful policies, Trump has pushed a rescissions bill, enacted pocket rescissions and impounded money appropriated by Congress. Republicans knew Democrats were fed up and eager for a fight, yet GOP leaders didn’t truly engage minority leadership on how to keep the government open, suggesting they should simply vote for a clean CR.

With Trump canceling Thursday’s meeting, Democrats now have the ability to say that the president is having a “tantrum,” and simply acting as an angry child, as Schumer put it.

“By refusing to even sit down with Democrats, Donald Trump is causing the shutdown. This is a Donald Trump shutdown,” Schumer said Tuesday during a stop in Brooklyn. “Stop ranting, stop these long diatribes that mean nothing to anyone. Get people in a room, and let’s hammer out a deal.”

Sen. Brian Schatz (Hawaii), in line to be the next Democratic whip, said Trump’s about-face is “a pretty serious blunder” that “illustrates that Donald Trump doesn’t know how to avoid a shutdown because he thinks he’s a monarch.”

In a letter to his Democratic colleagues, Jeffries said Trump “chickened out.” Jeffries also tweeted the “Trump Always Chickens Out,” or TACO line used by the president’s critics, something Trump has shown he doesn’t like.

Here’s more from Jeffries:

How Republicans view the situation. Johnson doesn’t want Republicans back in Washington next week with nothing to do. The House Republican leadership feels as if they’ve already done their job by passing a CR. Calling members back is a concession they have more work to do, GOP sources said.

Furthermore, Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune weren’t hot on a Trump-Schumer-Jeffries meeting. Top Hill Republicans believe that Democratic leaders have boxed themselves in and don’t deserve an audience with the president.

In Johnson and Thune’s view, there’s nothing to negotiate. Schumer and Jeffries need to take the clean CR.

There’s also a belief within the Senate GOP leadership that they need to replicate the March CR process as much as possible in order to set Schumer up for a re-run in which he folds and feels the heat from the Democratic base. A Trump meeting didn’t happen during that showdown.

Yet folding here isn’t really an option for Schumer or Jeffries. It would be disastrous internal and external politics with very little upside for them or the party.

The politics. It’s true that Republicans are vulnerable here. The longer this impasse continues, the more Democrats will be able to remind the public that health care premiums will skyrocket for millions of Americans at the end of the year absent some congressional action on Obamacare subsidies.

And there are plenty of politically vulnerable Republicans who believe that allowing the enhanced Obamacare subsidies to expire means they’ll be at greater risk of losing their seats.

Furthermore, a new Washington Post/Ipsos poll had troubling numbers for congressional Republicans, showing that Americans want to elect a Democratic-run Congress as a check on Trump.

– Jake Sherman, Andrew Desiderio and John Bresnahan

WASHINGTON X THE WORLD

Lawmakers dish at UN General Assembly

NEW YORK — The United Nations General Assembly is the only annual gathering that brings together just about every world leader. In some cases, it’s their only time stepping foot on U.S. soil.

It’s a unique opportunity for members of Congress, too — especially those who travel to foreign capitals frequently on what’s known as a CODEL, or congressional delegation.

This week, Punchbowl News partnered with the World Economic Forum for a series of interviews with members of Congress, in addition to some sideline chats with other powerful lawmakers.

For the WEF programming, we spoke with Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee; Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.), the chair of the East Asia and Pacific subcommittee; and Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), ranking member of the U.S. Helsinki Commission and the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee.

You can watch those conversations in full here.

Syria sanctions. One of the most remarkable moments of the summit so far was a conversation between retired Gen. David Petraeus and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, who were once on opposite sides of the war on terror.

This divide is at the core of a dispute between the Senate and the House over whether to include in the annual defense policy bill a repeal of the Caesar Act, the economic sanctions imposed during Syria’s civil war.

Al-Sharaa, a former al Qaeda leader whose forces overthrew Bashar al-Assad last year, has been making the case to U.S. lawmakers that the sanctions should be repealed in order to spur badly-needed foreign investment that can help rebuild the war-torn country.

The Senate’s version of the bill includes a repeal of those sanctions, which the Trump administration supports. But the House’s NDAA doesn’t, and it’s unclear how the issue will be resolved.

After meeting with al-Sharaa in New York, Meeks seemed to have concerns about lifting the sanctions, using the Ronald Reagan phrase “trust but verify.”

“I need to see and to make sure that they’re going to be moving in the right direction that brings people together, especially some of the religious minorities,” Meeks said. “I’m hopeful. I want him to be able to succeed.”

Meanwhile, Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.), who also attended the meeting with al-Sharaa and met with him in Damascus for two hours last month, sees the recent developments in Syria as a once-in-a-generation opportunity for regional stability. She strongly supports a full repeal.

Shaheen, the top Democrat on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said she was glad Meeks heard directly from al-Sharaa about his commitments, particularly on keeping Iran out of Syria.

“I’m hopeful that [Meeks] will agree that it’s important to do the repeal,” Shaheen said.

Palestinian statehood. Several Democrats came out in support of the decision by the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and France to formally recognize a Palestinian state, saying the United States should do the same.

Meeks and Shaheen aren’t there quite yet.

Shaheen said the United States should first put pressure on Israel to end the bombing in Gaza and develop a postwar plan. Shaheen said the allies’ recognition is “the result of frustration that people are feeling about how the Netanyahu government is conducting the war.”

Meeks similarly characterized a statehood recognition as premature, saying the war must end, the hostages must be released, and Hamas “must have no power in the potential of having a two-state solution.”

– Andrew Desiderio

THE CREATOR ECONOMY

ICYMI: Content to Commerce

We recently launched the third installment of our special project, The Creator Economy, in partnership with YouTube.

In the four-part series, we’re interviewing top content creators about their economic impact and how they’re approaching policy discussions in Washington.

For our latest feature, Content to Commerce, we spoke with Cassey Ho, a fitness creator and athleisure designer, about how content creators can take their online success to offline markets.

We also interviewed Sen. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) on how content creators are bringing jobs to California.

Don’t forget to listen to the podcast. And catch up on our first two features, Entertainment’s New Era with Dude Perfect CEO Andrew Yaffe and Setting the Stage with Cowboy Kent Rollins.

– Samantha Handler

THE CAMPAIGN

Grijalva wins. Democrat Adelita Grijalva won Tuesday night’s special election in Arizona, formally succeeding her late father, Rep. Raúl Grijalva. The elder Grijalva died on March 13 following a long battle with cancer.

Grijalva easily defeated Republican Daniel Butierez in the Arizona 7th District race, per the Associated Press. Grijalva won nearly 69% of the vote in this overwhelmingly blue district.

The younger Grijalva’s victory brings the House margin to 219 Republicans versus 214 Democrats — a two-vote edge — with two vacancies.

It also means that there will now be 218 members to sign onto the discharge petition approving a subpoena to the Justice Department requiring the release of the full Jeffrey Epstein files to the House. This will trigger a vote on the underlying bill on the House floor.

News: Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas) is rolling out new endorsements from 15 former House Republicans from Texas in his primary race against Attorney General Ken Paxton.

The list includes former Texas GOP Reps. Kevin Brady, Mac Thornberry, Jeb Hensarling, Bill Flores, Michael Burgess, Mike Conaway, Ted Poe, Pete Olson, Kenny Marchant, John Culberson, Lamar Smith, Francisco Canseco, Henry Bonilla, Tom DeLay and Bill Archer.

“I have been privileged to serve with many talented, intelligent, committed conservatives who have fought with me to represent Texas values and pass conservative reforms in Washington,” Cornyn said. “Sandy and I are honored by their trust, their confidence and their support in this critical race.”

Candidate launch. Republican Jessi Ebben is launching a run today for Wisconsin’s 7th District, which Rep. Tom Tiffany (R-Wis.) is vacating as he runs for governor. Ebben is a PR professional who previously ran for Wisconsin’s 3rd District in 2020. She lost to now-Rep. Derrick Van Orden (R-Wis.) in that primary.

— Andrew Desiderio and Ally Mutnick

MOMENTS

CLIPS