Gee, what a surprise.
Eight Senate Democrats sold out their party, surrendered the 40-day fight, and forged a deal with MAGA Republicans to end the government shutdown in exchange for winning nothing in return. Is that totally in character or what? Dems stomping on their own grassroots momentum by going belly up is so Dems. Please excuse this Red Sox analogy: I haven’t seen a choke this bad since the easy grounder rolled through Bill Buckner’s legs.
There still may be an upside for timid Team Blue, but first I need to fume. Did the eight senators in the Cave Caucus (all of whom are insulated from voter wrath because they’re either retiring or not up for reelection in 2026) somehow fail to notice what happened earlier this month?
Democrats won landslide elections coast to coast, kicking Trump’s capacious rear thanks to a massive grassroots turnout, precisely because they were finally fighting back, because they were slamming the brakes on Trump’s authoritarian rule, because they were highlighting MAGA’s refusal to extend the federal subsidies for Obamacare. And they were winning the messaging war; by double-digit percentages in poll after poll, the public has blamed Trump and his Capitol Hill toadies for the shutdown – and supported the Democratic stance on affordable Obamacare.
After all the landslide wins, even Trump admitted he and his cult got clobbered because of the shutdown. Because they were forcing millions of needy people to go hungry. Because they were screwing with people who want to fly. Because, all told, they want to force-feed Americans to drink their Cruel-Aid.
Typically, a shutdown hurts the party that triggered it. Newt Gingrich and his congressional GOP lost the shutdown of 1995, where they failed to pressure President Bill Clinton into signing their conservative budget bill. Ted Cruz led a government shutdown in 2013, intent on sabotaging Obamacare, but he failed abysmally. The difference this time, a rarity indeed, was that the triggering party was winning in the court of public opinion.
So naturally, those eight Dems threw in the towel.
All they got in return was a Republican pinky promise to hold a (meaningless) vote in December on extending the Obamacare subsidies. Angus King, the Maine independent senator who caucuses with the Dems, went on TV today and uttered this white-flag classic: “Standing up to Donald Trump didn’t work.” Um, yes it did. Rick Wilson, the former Republican strategist, said it best: “A shutdown that was bleeding the MAGA GOP dry will end because (those Dems) were suckers who make Neville Chamberlain look like Genghis Khan.”
What are the odds the Senate’s December vote on those Obamacare subsidies will result in a Democratic win? What are the odds a hefty share of MAGA Republicans will cross the aisle and keep coverage affordable?
Senator Jeanne Shaheen, a member of the Cave Caucus, actually says this: “We’ve heard from a number of our colleagues on the other side of the aisle that they’re willing to come to the table, they’re willing to work with us once the government is open to get this done. We’ve heard the same thing from the White House. So now we’ll see if they’re really gonna work with us.”
Surely she’s not that naive. But she’s retiring, so why should she care?
OK, I’m done fuming. Hard as it may be to believe, there’s a potential political upside to this debacle.
When that December vote happens, Senate Republicans will refuse to extend the Obamacare subsidies, thereby screwing the 22 million Americans who face huge premium hikes this winter. And even if the Senate were somehow to vote in favor of compassion, rest assured Mike Johnson’s House MAGAts would stonewall it.
Therein lies the Democrats’ political opportunity: the fact that MAGAts in Washington don’t give the remotest flying you-know-what about affordable health care.
Democrats already own the health care affordability issue. If and when Trump’s legislative minions smack down the Obamacare subsidies – voting, in essence, to spike the cost of people’s coverage – Democrats can hammer that issue from now until the midterm elections. And it plays well everywhere, because it just so happens that Obamacare beneficiaries live disproportionately in red states.
Even the Trump camp knows MAGA congressional incumbents are vulnerable on that issue. Four months ago, Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio surveyed the most competitive House districts and concluded: “Among those most motivated to vote – an early indicator of midterm turnout – the Republican is down 7 points. If the Republican candidate lets the premium tax credit (the Obamacare subsidies) expire, the Republican trails the Democrat by 15 points. There is broad bipartisan support for the tax credits and their extension.”
Armed with that kind of midterm ammo, will Democrats unfurl the flag of battle and storm the ramparts 24/7?
Don’t answer that.
Copyright 2025 Dick Polman, distributed exclusively by Cagle Cartoons newspaper syndicate. Dick Polman, a veteran national political columnist based in Philadelphia and a Writer in Residence at the University of Pennsylvania, writes the Subject to Change newsletter. Email him at [email protected]