Senate Democrats continued to hold out on agreeing to end the record-long federal government shutdown on Thursday, despite Republican overtures to reverse federal employee layoffs in a bid to reopen shuttered agencies.
WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats continued to hold out on agreeing to end the record-long federal government shutdown on Thursday, despite Republican overtures to reverse federal employee layoffs as part of a bid to reopen shuttered agencies.
Democrats spent nearly two hours in their second closed-door caucus meeting in as many days on the 37th day of the longest government shutdown in U.S. history, which has furloughed about 750,000 federal employees, forced thousands more to work without pay and shut off food assistance and Head Start subsidies for millions of Americans, including children. A new pressure point was expected to open in the days ahead as major airports braced for a 10% cut in airline flights due to a lack of pay for air traffic controllers.After 14 failed votes on a short-term funding measure, the Senate is expected to vote again on Friday, but this time with the understanding that the bill would be amended in coming days to include bipartisan legislation to reopen federal agencies and fund some programs for the full year."My hopes and expectations are always that we're going to have enough Democrats to actually proceed," Senate Majority Leader John Thune, of South Dakota, told reporters. "We'll see. They seem to be walking back or slow-walking this."Republicans hold a 53-47 majority but need 60 votes to reopen the government. With one Republican opposed to short-term funding, Thune would need at least eight Democrats to break with their party. Up until now, only two Democrats and an independent who caucuses with them have been willing to do so.Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York described his caucus' meeting as "a very good, productive meeting." Others struck similarly upbeat tones.But some Democrats were less sanguine. "I don't know how productive it was in there," said Sen. John Fetterman, of Pennsylvania, one of only three members of the Senate Democratic Conference to support a short-term bill to reopen the government.Republicans said they offered Democrats a path to reopening the government that included a short-term stopgap funding measure and a package of full-year appropriations bills to pay for agriculture programs including food assistance, military construction, veterans affairs and the legislative branch.Possible reversal of layoffsIn bipartisan talks, Republicans have also shown an openness to reversing some of the mass federal workforce layoffs ordered by President Donald Tr
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