The longest shutdown in U.S. history is starting to wind down after a bloc of Senate Democrats joined Republicans on a deal to reopen the federal government, but Connecticut’s senators opposed the agreement because it made no guarantee to extend the policy at the heart of the shutdown fight: expiring health care subsidies.
The Senate’s key procedural vote late Sunday capped off a weekend scramble to put a deal in motion and move to the beginning stages of ending the 41-day shutdown. More than a dozen previous votes failed over the past month, but enough Democrats changed their vote after a series of negotiations to break the impasse.
Eight Democrats joined all Republicans in a 60-40 vote Sunday night to help clear the 60-vote threshold needed to advance bills in the Senate.
But like the majority of their Democratic colleagues, U.S. Sens. Chris Murphy and Richard Blumenthal still rejected the deal because it didn’t go far enough on the Affordable Care Act subsidies that expire at the end of the year. The deal, among other things, ultimately promised a vote in the Senate next month on extending the subsidies, but there is no guarantee it passes, and House GOP leadership hasn’t committed to a vote in the lower chamber.
Democrats, like Murphy and Blumenthal, argued last week’s electoral victories gave them a mandate to keep pushing for the extension of health care subsidies as part of a package to fund the government and to not relent in negotiations. If the enhanced premium subsidies expire at the end of the year with no congressional action, those enrolled in plans through the state’s health care exchange, Access Health CT, are expected to see their premiums for 2026 plans increase.
On the health care front, Democrats weren’t offered anything new. The promise of a vote on the expiring subsidies was offered by Senate GOP leadership weeks earlier as a way out of the shutdown. The deal says Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., will set up a vote by the second week of December. That leaves little time for Congress to address it.
The vast majority of Senate Democrats are disappointed by the outcome. The fate of the enhanced premium subsidies is still up in the air. Plus, their push to ensure that the Trump administration doesn’t keep rescinding federal funding approved by Congress went nowhere and wasn’t included in the final agreement. Because of that, the Democratic base is likely to be frustrated after the party extracted few concessions.
“People know the government shutdown hurts. But people also know that Americans will die when millions cannot afford health insurance next year because of Trump’s massive premium hikes. They wanted us to continue that fight, even knowing that victory was not certain,” Murphy said in a statement. “They did not want this outcome.”
“I understand my colleagues’ desire to fund the government. What Trump has put people through these last few weeks is abhorrent. Of course I want to end the shutdown too. But not at any cost,” Murphy said. “There is no way to sugarcoat this moment. It will have a cost. But it is up to us to keep the fight going.”
“My position has always been: no affordable health care, no deal. I am unwilling to accept a vague promise for a vote at an indefinite time on an indeterminate bill,” Blumenthal said in a statement. “Millions of Americans and tens of thousands in Connecticut are forced to make impossible choices right now about what health insurance they can afford.”
In addition to a vote on ACA subsidies, the Senate deal also included three full-year funding bills plus short-term funding for the rest of the government through Jan. 31. The original date of the short-term bill only funded agencies through Nov. 21. It would also guarantee back pay for furloughed federal workers — a requirement of a 2019 law, though President Donald Trump had suggested they might not get paid. And the bill would also reverse layoffs during the shutdown, which were on hold by federal court.
Pressure was building for a resolution, ultimately leading to the negotiations involving a handful of Senate Democrats. Federal nutrition aid is still in limbo after the Trump administration gave mixed messaging on funding November SNAP benefits and states like Connecticut started to fill in the gaps. On top of that, multiple major airports started to cut the number of flights amid ongoing delays and cancellations. And federal workers — both furloughed and essential — continue to miss more paychecks.
“I’m looking forward to seeing what solutions might be brought forward [on health care]. Regardless, as I have said for weeks to my Democrat friends, I will schedule a vote on their proposal. And I have committee to having that vote no later than the second weekend in December,” Thune, the Senate GOP leader, said minutes before the vote. “I’m optimistic that after six weeks of this shutdown, we’ll be able to end it.
The Connecticut senators’ opposition was consistent to what they’ve been saying throughout the 41-day shutdown: they won’t accept loose promises on health care. And both parties looked like they were digging in further after Tuesday’s elections.
Democrats believed voters were rewarding them for fighting for health care even if that meant the government remained in a shutdown. Trump even said the shutdown was partly to blame for Republicans’ losses.
But it still didn’t look like Trump wanted to enter negotiations with Democrats. He pushed for Republicans to get rid of the filibuster — the 60-vote threshold needed to advance bills in the Senate — but GOP leadership said the votes weren’t there to ax that procedure.
Because of that, some Democrats started to budge, saying that the length of the shutdown ultimately moved the needle for them. And when asked why they backed down on their key demand after weeks of trying, U.S. Sen. Angus King, an independent from Maine who caucuses with Democrats, said “because it wasn’t working.”
“It’s been six weeks. Republicans made it clear they weren’t going to discuss the health care issue … until the shutdown was over. We tried to keep working that for six weeks. It didn’t happen,” King said. “There’s a lot better chance now than there was this morning because nothing was happening and there was no evidence that another week or another two weeks or Thanksgiving or Christmas” would have changed Republicans mind on the health care subsidies.
What will happen in the House?
With final passage in the Senate imminent, all eyes move to the House next: will the vote be bipartisan or will Democrats try to force Republicans to come up with most or all of the votes? They only need a simple majority to pass legislation, but a slim majority for Republicans means there’s little room for error and the need for a united front without help from Democrats.
Some moderate Democrats appear open to supporting the Senate shutdown deal, but most so far are publicly opposed to supporting it. Since the key vote on Sunday, most of Connecticut’s House delegation has yet to weigh in on the new legislation and where they stand on it. The five Democrats, like their Senate colleagues, have said they wanted the extension of health care subsidies as part of a funding package.
U.S. Rep. John Larson, D-1st District, was the first member of the delegation on Monday to explicitly say he wouldn’t support the Senate shutdown deal whenever it makes its way over to the House.
“Ballrooms and billion-dollar bailouts to Argentina won’t help working families get by. They need real action to make life more affordable,” Larson said in a statement, referring to the White House renovations to build a new ballroom and the plans for a $20 billion bailout to help Argentina’s economic crisis.
“The plan Senate Republicans have put forward does nothing to address these concerns. Donald Trump and his minions in Congress didn’t have my vote when they created this health care crisis, and they don’t have my vote now,” he added.
U.S. Rep. Rosa DeLauro, who serves as the ranking member on the House Appropriations Committee, criticized Republicans for releasing the text of one of the full-year bills on Sunday before getting the support of Democrats in the House.
“While the Military Construction bill is better than the full-year CR those programs were funded under for 2025, it is important to place it in the context of the entire legislative package that will be considered,” DeLauro said. “Congress must invest in veterans, address the health care crisis that is raising costs on more than 20 million Americans and prevent President Trump from not spending appropriated dollars in our communities.”
The timeline for ending the shutdown is still up in the air, though it’s possible the lengthy process can wrap up later this week.
The Senate still needs to move to final passage of the bill, which only requires a simple majority. It’s possible senators can finish their part of the process by the end of Monday, but that would require agreements to quickly move things forward.
Then the House would need to come back into session to vote and complete the work of Congress. The lower chamber has been out since late September, but members will get 36 hours’ notice to return to Washington, D.C., when it’s time to vote.
If the bill passes the House, it will then move to Trump for the final step. And if he signs it, the shutdown will come to an end. The federal workforce would return to work and expect to receive back pay.
This story was originally published in the Connecticut Mirror.
