The US Capitol in Washington. DC on Wednesday, October 8, 2025. (Photo by Jennifer Shutt/States Newsroom)
WASHINGTON – As we entered the 21st day of the government shutdown, the political tensions and policy differences that contributed to it appeared likely to scuttle any chance for the Republican Party-controlled Congress to find the bipartisanship needed to pass the dozens of bills needed to fund the government.
It’s all par for the course in baseball, but if the 12 budget bills are not approved, lawmakers’ funding requests for high-profile projects in their home states, known as earmarks, will be blocked from becoming law – such as road construction, water systems, education projects, research facilities and more.
A full-year stopgap bill would also create significant headaches for departments across the government as they struggled to adjust to the series of emergency shortfalls that have funded the government over the last year, even without the turmoil of layoffs and funding cuts imposed by the Donald Trump administration.
The full-year spending bills are also Congress’s best chance to exercise its constitutional authority over government spending and are designed to spur debate about where the taxes Americans pay can facilitate the country most.
By skipping this process and avoiding tough discussions about where funding is most needed and where it isn’t, you absolve lawmakers of a core job: raising money to facilitate their constituents live better lives.
On Tuesday, Democrats and Republicans appeared to be nowhere near an agreement on reopening the government was closed since October 1st. House members are not in session and last voted on September 19th. The Senate voted unsuccessfully 11 times to the same stopgap bill passed by the House of Representatives, but it did not receive the 60 votes needed for passage.
“Extremely harmful” effect of another emergency solution
Senate Appropriations Chairwoman Susan Collins, R-Maine, said she opposed using a so-called standing resolution for the rest of the fiscal year rather than working out a deal on state funding legislation for the entire year.
“The impact of another year-long CR would be extremely damaging to federal programs, particularly the Department of Defense, and should be avoided at all costs,” Collins said.
Congress used three continuing resolutions to maintain government funding during the most recent fiscal year, which ended September 30.
Lawmakers have relied on stopgap legislation a few times in recent decades to fund the government for the entire fiscal year.
However, Congress has not used stopgap legislation for two years in a row since the slow 1970s, they say a report from the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service.
Senate Republicans have lunch with Trump
Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said after a White House lunch with President Donald Trump and other Republican senators that talks on year-round government funding legislation could not begin until after the shutdown ends.
“We want a normal approval process. We want to give them the opportunity to sit down and litigate some of the issues they want to talk about,” Thune said. “But that can’t happen until the government reopens.”
North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven, chairman of the farm appropriations subcommittee, said a year-round resolution is “absolutely” possible if the process doesn’t move forward soon.
But Hoeven wouldn’t say whether he would vote for an emergency budget bill that would render the appropriations process obsolete for the second year in a row. And said he was “of course” concerned about the negative impact of a year-round solution.
“I don’t want to preempt the process. What I want to do is open up the government and get back to normal order,” Hoeven said.
Rhode Island Sen. Jack Reed, the top Democrat on the Armed Services Committee and a top appropriator, said it will take real leadership in both chambers to get movement on full-year bills. He also said he was vehemently opposed to a full year stopgap measure.
“I think if we vote for a full-year CR, we have completely abdicated our constitutional responsibility to have the power of the purse,” Reed said.
South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds, who sits on the Appropriations Committee, said he “couldn’t support a full-year CR.”
“We’ve done so much work, and now it’s just a matter of whether Democrats will allow us to take them to task,” Rounds said, referring to the full-year defense spending bill didn’t make it past last week.
Rounds said he believes Democrats are struggling to find a way to end the government shutdown that might allow work on full-year bills to get back on track.
“I think they made a very serious strategic error when they decided to step in and shut down the government in the first place,” Rounds said. “And now they don’t have an elegant way out, and that’s a problem.”
process, interrupted
Normally, Republicans and Democrats would have agreed by now on how much they would spend on defense and domestic programs and divided that roughly $1.8 trillion across the dozens of full-year government spending bills.
Lawmakers tasked with drafting these budget bills would have begun meeting to work out the spending levels and policy differences between the original House bills and the original Senate bills.
Because of the shutdown, that’s all on hold and may never happen, which may prompt Republicans to draft a stopgap bill for the rest of the year.
Republican Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama, chair of the Homeland Security budget subcommittee, said she wanted Democrats to vote to reopen the government so she could get back to work on her full-year budget proposal.
“I want to do my job, which is why I’m so frustrated that we couldn’t move forward with the budget bills on Thursday,” Britt said, also referring to the defense bill. “I think it was incredibly short-sighted of my Democratic colleagues to vote against it, because this is our chance to actually do work for the American people. And I think we should do our jobs and not pass the buck.”
Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz, the top Democrat on the Subcommittee on State and Foreign Operations, said he still has “hope for the appropriations process.”
“Of course we have to get through the shutdown, but there is a bipartisan desire to get something done and avoid a year-round CR,” Schatz said, adding that it would be tough to get anything done outside of the House session.
New Hampshire Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, the ranking Democrat on the farm appropriations subcommittee, opposes using a full-year continuing resolution when negotiating bipartisan versions of year-round government funding bills.
“I’m concerned about a full year CR and think we should go back to the appropriations process and get these bills done,” Shaheen said. “I think there is interest on both sides.”
Unknown waters
Wisconsin Sen. Tammy Baldwin, the top Democrat on the Labor, HHS and Education Appropriations Subcommittee, said GOP leaders must accept the regular give-and-take of bipartisan negotiations if they want to get anything through the upper chamber.
“I think first and foremost we really need to make sure that Speaker (Mike) Johnson realizes that the only path forward on appropriations and other issues is a bipartisan path,” Baldwin said. “That’s the only way you can pass things that require 60 votes in the Senate.”
Baldwin said that means both chambers should exploit the overall spending level that received bipartisan support in the Senate Budget Committee, rather than the lower spending level used by the House panel.
Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, was far more negative than many of his colleagues.
“I think you live in a world that doesn’t exist,” Murphy told States Newsroom. “I think 2025 is completely different than any other year before. Our democracy is literally dying beneath our feet. The president is involved in mass crime and corruption, and nothing we’ve done here in the past will set a precedent for what will happen in the future. The House of Representatives has never boycotted Washington in a month and a half. The majority party has never refused to negotiate with the minority party. So I think we’re in a really uncharted position.” waters, and nothing can happen until the Republicans in the House return and the Republicans in the Senate decide to negotiate.”
