Some congressional Democrats fear they've handed Republican lawmakers a "playbook" to pass future spending bills that will give President Donald Trump everything he wants for his agenda, reports a new article in Politico.
Their fears were solidified last week when 10 Senate Democrats, including Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), voted to pass the funding bill crafted by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA). Nearly all House Democrats voted against the stopgap measure, claiming it gave President Donald Trump and Elon Musk's DOGE "the leeway to continue slashing the federal government without oversight."
"Senate Democrats have already started discussing privately how to avoid getting rolled again," wrote Politico's Jordain Carney. "They bet this month that House Republicans would never be able to pass a stopgap funding bill without Democratic support, and Democrats hoped they could leverage that failure into a bipartisan deal. That assumption backfired when Speaker Mike Johnson called their bluff, sending the Senate a funding patch that passed the House with only one Republican opposing it."
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The article continued, "Some Democrats are now afraid that they inadvertently gave Republicans a playbook for government funding fights in the future: Cut Democrats out of the negotiations, muscle legislation through the House with only GOP votes and bet they can jam the Senate."
Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) warned that Democrats set a “really dangerous precedent” with Friday night's vote, and questioned “why would Republicans work with us” going forward, the article said.
Schumer argued that a government shutdown would have been more detrimental to federal workers than the provisions in the funding bill. The move has led to tanking approval ratings for Congressional Democrats.
CNN's Manu Raju reported Monday that Schumer canceled upcoming events to publicize his new book on antisemitism due to security concerns from what are expected to be mass protests against his failure to fight against the funding bill.