Why Senate Democrats want to keep fighting

IN THIS EDITION

Shutdown drags on as Senate seeks path forward

Chris Murphy wants to fight

Prop 50 kicks off California candidate scramble

Maryland Senate delegation sides with Moore in redistricting spat

THE TOP

Shutdown drags on as Senate seeks path forward

Happy Friday morning.

It’s Day 38 of the shutdown. There’s no resolution in sight to the crisis yet, although there’s lots of action.

The House has been out of session for 49 days.

The Senate is expected to vote today — for the 15th time — on the House-passed stopgap funding bill. Democrats will block it. What happens after that is a big question mark.

Bipartisan negotiations are expected to continue, but there’s not much hope for an immediate solution. Democrats will keep the shutdown going as they push for new concessions from Republicans on health care, federal layoffs and more.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune may send senators home for the weekend following the CR vote, but no decision on the schedule has been made yet. Either way, it’s pretty much guaranteed that the shutdown will drag into next week at the least. And the fallout from the impasse will continue to worsen.

There’s enormous confusion — and consternation — over the Trump administration’s handling of the SNAP program, which helps feed more than 40 million Americans. A federal judge ordered the administration to fully fund the program on Thursday, but the Justice Department said it would appeal the ruling.

In the meantime, a 4% reduction in flight capacity at major U.S. airports takes effect today and will increase by 1% each day until it reaches 10%. That means thousands of flight cancellations per day, impacting millions of Americans, as well as those visitors flying in and out of the country.

Dems dig in. A bipartisan deal to end the shutdown seemed within reach earlier this week. But Senate Democrats spent a two-hour caucus meeting Thursday taking stock of where things stand and came to this conclusion: Why on earth would we fold now?

Shutdown pain notwithstanding, Democratic senators made the case that they’re in the strongest position they’ve been in since the stalemate began. (“Every day gets better for us,” one might say.) Democrats are convinced that they can get an even better deal if they hold out a bit longer.

Here are just a few reasons why Senate Democrats feel comfortable continuing to block floor action on reopening the government:

— Negotiators haven’t decided on an end date for the CR. The three-bill minibus still isn’t finalized, even among Republicans. There isn’t an agreement on the structure or exact timing for an Obamacare subsidies vote, including whether there will be a side-by-side vote on a GOP alternative, as Sen. Dan Sullivan (R-Alaska) called for during a closed-door meeting Tuesday. Even though Democrats have multiple chances to filibuster any such agreement, they don’t think they should help advance what would become the vehicle for a deal that’s not even done.

— After Tuesday’s election victories, Democrats believe voters gave them a mandate to keep up the shutdown fight. Sens. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), among others, implored their colleagues to “keep fighting” during Thursday’s closed-door session.

— Republicans have told Democrats they’d be willing to discuss language reversing President Donald Trump’s mass layoffs of federal workers. Democrats want to push hard on this, as well as overturning OMB’s blue-state funding cuts.

— Trump is at his most volatile and vulnerable right now, and Democrats think they can take advantage. Trump is picking fights with Senate Republicans over the filibuster. The president privately told GOP’s senators that the election results show that the shutdown has been “worse for us than for [Democrats].” So Democrats will try to stoke Trump’s anger and see what happens.

Dems debate. Senate Democrats emerged from Thursday’s caucus meeting proclaiming that they’re “unified.” But let’s acknowledge that not every Democrat is comfortable with this strategy, which effectively amounts to using the pain of a shutdown as leverage to achieve a policy aim.

“I think we can address the health care crisis and not have to shut down the government,” said Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), who’s been voting for weeks to end the shutdown. “I don’t believe in this idea of using federal workers and people who rely on federal programs as leverage.”

Others Democrats eager to get past the shutdown argue that they can’t realistically expect to get a better deal than what’s on the table.

Bipartisan talks. Democrats involved in cross-aisle talks have been trying to convince their Democratic colleagues that a commitment to vote on an Obamacare subsidies bill could actually lead to a positive outcome.

It’s a tough sell, though. Most Democrats think it’ll amount to a “show” vote that dies in the Senate.

But, as we scooped on Thursday, the two sides have actually been exchanging paper on various proposed GOP reforms that Democrats are, so far, not recoiling at. At least 10 Republicans have approached Democrats to express interest in an extension of the tax credits, as we scooped on Tuesday. That includes Sens. Ashley Moody (R-Fla.) and Jon Husted (R-Ohio), for example — both of whom are on the ballot in 2026.

Then there’s the question of how an Obamacare compromise could get through the House, where Speaker Mike Johnson isn’t making any guarantees.

Freshmen Senate Democrats huddled Thursday to figure out how to maneuver a bill through the House, resolving that they’d touch base with their former GOP colleagues in that chamber, as we scooped.

Two of those freshmen — Sens. Lisa Blunt Rochester (D-Del.) and Andy Kim (D-N.J.) — plan to meet today with Reps. Brian Fitzpatrick (R-Pa.) and Jeff Van Drew (R-N.J.).

The reality is that any Obamacare compromise will be very difficult to pass in both chambers without involvement from Trump.

— Andrew Desiderio and John Bresnahan

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FLY OUT DAY

Chris Murphy wants to fight

Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) spent much of President Joe Biden’s tenure trying to cut deals with Republicans. Gun control. Changes to the Electoral Count Act. Immigration reform. Ukraine funding.

But that was a different Chris Murphy.

Now Murphy has all but stopped raising money for his own political efforts, instead funneling seven figures into “protest organizations all around the country.” The third-term senator says the “core” of his job “is different right now.”

“I think the Republican Party has signed up to destroy our democracy, and I think the primary job of any United States senator is to mobilize Americans to protect our democracy,” Murphy said on Fly Out Day. “I don’t see them right now as good faith partners to create bipartisan legislation that protects the people I represent.”

The question for Murphy is one we ask all the time about ambitious young pols: what does he want?

The 52-year-old has been in Congress for 19 years. He’s unlikely to be the next Senate Democratic leader; Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) looks to be in the pole position there.

Murphy, though, is making the moves a pol would make if they want to run for president. Murphy was in Miami earlier this week to talk about Obamacare premiums. He’s heading to New Hampshire next week for an event with state Democrats. He toured the country with Florida Democratic Rep. Maxwell Frost.

“I’m certainly not planning on it right now, because I’m not sure that we’re going to have a free and fair election in 2028,” Murphy said when asked if he was running for president. “So for me, the project is save the democracy, and then — if democracy is still alive and well in 2028 — then everybody’s gonna have a decision to make.”

For now, Murphy has emerged as one of the most prominent progressives in the Trump era and his view on the shutdown is carrying the day inside the Senate Democratic Caucus.

The election. Murphy sees Tuesday night’s election results — wins in New Jersey and Virginia — as watershed moments for Democrats.

The Connecticut Democrat said the Democratic romp was, put simply, “a referendum on Trump.”

Murphy chalked up the huge Democratic turnout to for the “first time, they’re seeing a party fight.”

The shutdown. We sat down with Murphy just before the key Senate Democratic meeting on whether to end the shutdown or cut a deal with Republicans.

Murphy’s view — that the party should keep fighting — won the day. Here’s how Murphy described his thinking:

You can watch the full conversation here.

– Jake Sherman

THE GOLDEN STATE

Prop 50 kicks off California candidate scramble

California finally has a new congressional map. Now, the musical chairs begin as candidates jump in and incumbents rush to launch in new districts.

This redistricting gives Democrats the chance to pick up five seats. Three of those seats will be fairly easy flips. Two will be harder. Two Democratic incumbents will remain in battleground seats, while two others were drawn into safer seats.

And there will be a massive open-seat primary to replace retiring Democratic Rep. Nancy Pelosi in San Francisco.

Here’s everything we know so far about the new map:

The pick-ups: California’s 1st District, held by GOP Rep. Doug LaMalfa, is now deep blue. Look for state Senate President Pro Tempore Mike McGuire to run here. Audrey Denney, who ran in 2020, is already in.

— Rep. Ami Bera (D-Calif.) announced he would run in California’s new 3rd District, currently held by GOP Rep. Kevin Kiley. This is the second potential flip option for Democrats. Former Vice President Kamala Harris won it by 10 points. Kiley hasn’t said where he’ll run.

“It’s entirely possible Kevin decides to run against me,” Bera said. “I feel pretty confident, having run some of the hardest races in the country.”

— California’s 41st District, currently held by GOP Rep. Ken Calvert, is now in Los Angeles County. Rep. Linda Sánchez (D-Calif.) is expected to run here. Hilda Solis, a former member and Labor secretary, is planning to run to replace Sanchez in the 38th District. Calvert is running in the 40th District against Rep. Young Kim (R-Calif.).

— GOP Rep. Darrell Issa saw his 48th District turn from deep red to light blue. Harris won it by three points. 2020 candidate Ammar Campa-Najjar and San Diego City Councilwoman Marni von Wilpert are among the Democrats running here.

— Rep. David Valadao’s 22nd District got a little better for Democrats – but not by that much. It changed from a seat President Donald Trump won by six points to one he won by two points.

The new safe seats. Democratic Reps. Josh Harder and Dave Min traded swingy seats for blue ones. Former Stockton Mayor Kevin Lincoln dropped his bid against Harder and jumped to challenge Democratic Rep. Adam Gray in a neighboring seat.

The remaining swing seats. Gray’s Central Valley seat remains competitive — Harris would have won it by less than one point. Democratic Rep. Derek Tran’s Orange County-based district is also purple. Harris would have won it by four points.

Bera’s jump to the 3rd District leaves the Sacramento-area 6th District open. Harris would have won it by nine points. Names to watch there: former state Sen. Richard Pan, Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho and state Sen. Angelique Ashby.

Republicans may also try to target Democratic Rep. Jim Costa. His Central Valley seat moved to the right at the presidential level in 2024. It got a little better in the redraw but could potentially remain competitive.

– Ally Mutnick

REDISTRICTING WATCH

Maryland Senate delegation sides with Moore in redistricting spat

While Maryland state Senate President Bill Ferguson is opposed to Democratic Gov. Wes Moore’s (D-Md.) initiative to draw new House lines, Moore has two Senate allies on Capitol Hill.

Maryland Democrats, led by Moore, are seeking to tweak the state’s current 7-1 Democratic lean to a clean 8-0 sweep. But Ferguson is resisting, arguing a new House map could backfire and lead to Democrats losing seats.

In the Capitol, however, Maryland Democrats are behind Moore.

“I’m in favor of moving forward with redistricting, so I’m with the governor,” Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) told us.

Moore appointed Sen. Angela Alsobrooks (D-Md.) to lead his Redistricting Advisory Commission, an effort to add momentum to draw Rep. Andy Harris (R-Md.) out of his seat.

Alsobrooks, the former Prince George’s County executive, is echoing Moore’s calls for “fair and representative maps.”

“We just want to make sure at all times that we have fair elections and that the map is a fair map,” Alsobrooks said. “This is about bringing together various stakeholders, and making sure that Maryland is doing everything it can to preserve the voting rights of our own constituents.”

Pro-redistricting Democrats hope to pressure Ferguson into supporting the push to draw new maps ahead of the 2026 cycle.

— Max Cohen

… AND THERE’S MORE

Downtown Download. Brian Ballard, the lobbyist who is said to be close to the Trump administration, is now lobbying for ​Jemmstone LLC, a marijuana company.

The Campaign. Tennessee state Rep. Aftyn Behn, a Democrat running in a special election for former Rep. Mark Green’s (R-Tenn.) seat, has a new 30-second ad up.

The spot criticizes Republicans for passing “tax cuts for billionaires” and “burying the Epstein files.” Behn also says in the ad that Republicans cut “health care for Tennessee families” and support tariffs, which “hurt our economy.” Behn is running against Republican Matt Van Epps.

You can watch the spot here.

– Jake Sherman

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