A mere day after Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) proclaimed that Republicans don’t have the votes to clear the way for a continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government through September, the New York Democrat has caved and will vote for cloture to allow the recently passed CR a vote in the Senate.
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“Republicans do not have the votes in the Senate to invoke cloture on the House CR,” Schumer proclaimed Wednesday. “Funding the government should be a bipartisan effort, but Republicans chose a partisan path drafting their continuing resolution without any input from congressional Democrats.”
Schumer’s grandstanding on Wednesday sure looked like a bluff — a desperate attempt to strong-arm the GOP into accepting the Democrats’ 30-day stopgap plan. But Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) didn’t flinch. Instead, he called Schumer’s bluff, and Schumer has waved the white flag in surrender.
In a floor speech Thursday evening, Schumer admitted that he was left with no choice but to support the GOP’s measure, despite railing against it as “deeply partisan” and “a terrible option.”
“For sure, the Republican bill is a terrible option. It is not a clean CR,” he complained. “It doesn’t address far too many of this country’s needs. But I believe allowing Donald Trump to take even more, even much more power via a government shutdown is a far worse option.”
Schumer, who spent weeks attacking Republicans for allegedly following Trump’s lead, said the situation was a “Hobson’s choice,” meaning that there was no real alternative. “Either proceed with the bill before us or… risk Donald Trump throwing America into the chaos of a shutdown,” he declared. “This, in my view, is no choice at all.”
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That’s cute. Something tells me that Democrat polling showed that the public was going to blame the Democrats for the shutdown, and that’s what this is really about.
Just days ago, Schumer insisted that Democrats had put forward “a sensible way [to] fund the government for another month,” only for Republicans to reject it “outright.” He accused the GOP of bowing to Trump and claimed, “Donald Trump doesn’t want the appropriators to do their job. He wants full control over government spending.” Blah, blah, blah.
The same Schumer who just called Trump a “nihilist” who “wielded chaos like a weapon” is now falling in line to support a Republican bill he despises. After spending weeks accusing Republicans of being “sycophants and MAGA radicals who want to burn everything to the ground,” Schumer is now voting for their CR — an admission that he lost this fight.
The writing has been on the wall for weeks — Democrats were always going to cave. Despite Schumer’s tough talk on Wednesday, Senate Democrats had already begun negotiating their surrender terms behind closed doors. His public defiance was nothing more than a bluff, a last-ditch attempt to save face before doing exactly what everyone knew they would: fold.
🚨 This must be HUMILIATING for Chuck Schumer!
“I believe it is my job to make the best choice for the country, to minimize the harms to the American people. Therefore, I will vote to keep the government open and not shut it down.” pic.twitter.com/BoA9JWVqtP
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) March 13, 2025
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I previously wrote that Democrats would find some excuse to “reluctantly” support moving the process forward and ultimately allow the CR to pass. And that’s exactly what happened. As predicted, they put on a show, delivering fiery speeches about their so-called principles, railing against Trump, and pretending to stand their ground before quietly conceding and giving Republicans exactly what they wanted.
Now, in a desperate attempt to spin their capitulation as some kind of victory, Democrats are claiming that by letting the CR move forward, they’re actually standing up to Trump. It’s an absurd narrative, but it’s all they have left. The reality is simple: They talked big, they made their threats, and when the moment of truth arrived, they blinked.
This isn’t just a huge humiliation for Schumer and the Democrats; it’s a tremendous victory for Donald Trump and the GOP!
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