Senate Democrats Advance Republican CR, Avoid Government Shutdown

Ten Democrats voted to advance the continuing resolution (CR) to fund the government through September, setting the stage for the Republican-led measure to pass with a simple majority. The continuing resolution must be passed before midnight on Friday, March 14 to avoid a shutdown. Sixty votes were needed to end the discussion surrounding the CR (negate a filibuster). The vote to send the bill to a final decision was 62-38.

With a six-seat Republican advantage (53-47) in the Senate, the CR should be sent to President Donald Trump's (R) desk easily, with only a simple majority needed to pass the bill.

Republicans in the House (almost entirely along party lines) passed a continuing resolution to fund the government through the end of the fiscal year (through September), but Democrats in the upper chamber initially couldn't get the Senate version to the 60-vote necessary threshold to avoid a filibuster.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) led the charge to support the CR's passage on Thursday as he declared letting the government shut down would grant more power to President Trump as well as Elon Musk and their Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) initiative.

"Sycophants and MAGA radicals want to burn everything to the ground," began Sen. Schumer. "Look no further than what DOGE is doing now, Republicans' nihilism has brought us to the brink of disaster ... I have said many times there are no winners in a government shutdown, but there are certainly victims; the most vulnerable Americans who rely on federal programs to feed their families, to access medical care and to stay financially afloat. Communities that depend on government services to function will suffer and suffer greatly."

Schumer then reminded Democrats and the American public that the left side of the aisle offered a one-month stopgap to provide more time to avoid both a government shutdown and another continuing resolution but the GOP "rejected this proposal" as days turned into hours.

Nevertheless, Schumer declared the decision before him a "Hobson's choice" between accepting the "deeply partisan" continuing resolution or "throwing America into the chaos" of a government shutdown with President Trump at the helm.

"This, in my view, is no choice at all. While the CR bill is very bad, the potential for a shutdown has consequences for America that are much, much worse. For sure, the Republican bill is a terrible option. It is not a clean CR. It is deeply partisan. It doesn't address far too many of this country's needs. But I believe allowing Donald Trump to take even much more power via a government shutdown is a far worse option," said Schumer.

Here are the Democrat senators that joined Republicans today to avoid a shutdown: