The Messy Politics of the Democratic Shutdown Deal
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What led to the recent Democratic shutdown deal?
This is Andrew Ross Sorkin, the founder of Dealbook. Every year, I interview some of the world's most influential leaders across politics, culture, and business at the Dealbook Summit, a live event in New York City. On this year's podcast, you'll hear my unfiltered conversations with Gavin Newsom, the CEO of Palantir and Anthropic, and Erica Kirk, the widow of Charlie Kirk. Listen to Dealbook Summit wherever you get your podcasts.
From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today, the story of how a small group of Senate Democrats broke from their colleagues, struck a deal with Republicans to end the government shutdown, and touched off the latest civil war inside their party. I spoke with my colleagues, congressional reporter Katie Edmondson and national political correspondent Shane Goldmacher. It's Tuesday, November 11th.
Katie, welcome back.
Who are the Senate Democrats involved in the shutdown agreement?
Thank you, Michael. I just want to explain that we're talking to you on Monday afternoon after a head-spinning few days of news that could keep changing after we talk to you. And the reason the past few days have been head-spinning is that from the outside, it looked like Democrats were riding really high. after last Tuesday's election, which seemed to ratify their strategy of keeping the federal government shut down as a way of forcing Republicans and President Trump to reckon with these sky-high healthcare costs. In fact, it seemed to be working so well that in the aftermath of that election, Trump declared that the shutdown was being blamed on Republicans and was helping Democrats. He articulated that idea.
And then Democrats tossed this entire idea seemingly winning strategy out of the window. I didn't see that coming.
Well, I think it gave a lot of people a real sense of whiplash, Michael, because, as you said, I remember standing outside of Democrats' closed-door meeting on Wednesday, and they came out sounding thrilled by what voters had just done in...
What challenges did Democrats face during the shutdown?
New Jersey, New York, Virginia, which is to show overwhelmingly that they sided with the Democratic agenda here, which was focused on lowering costs specifically. And so we heard from a lot of Democrats, particularly progressive Democrats, that, look, voters have just vindicated what our strategy is and they're telling us they want us to keep up the fight. But I think what was always brewing under the surface, Michael, was that there was this small clutch of centrist Democrats who have grown really uncomfortable with all of the pain points that have emerged of the shutdown who are looking for some sort of off ramp.
Right. A clutch of Democrats who did not believe that the shutdown was the height of Democratic success. So tell us who these senators are and what they started to do.
Well, a lot of these senators hail from kind of purple or reddish states. A lot of these are senators who really pride themselves on having some sort of bipartisan credentials to their name, pride themselves on working across the aisle. And we're talking about the senators from New Hampshire, Senator Johnson. June Shaheen and Maggie Hassan.
How did the shutdown impact the Democratic Party's strategy?
We're talking about the senators from Nevada, Catherine Cortez Masto and Jackie Rosen. Angus King of Maine, he's actually an independent, but he caucuses with Democrats. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, of course, someone who frequently finds himself breaking with Democrats these days.
Mm-hmm.
We're talking about Senator Tim Kaine of Virginia. And finally and importantly, there's Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, who's actually the number two Democrat. He is the party's whip who will not be running for reelection at the end of his term. Mm hmm. And I think one of the conclusions that they all ended up coming to together is that the chief demand that their party had been asking for, which is for Republicans to vote to extend the Affordable Care Act subsidies that are set to expire at the end of the year, was not going to happen. It was not in the cards.
What negotiations took place between Senate Democrats and Republicans?
And what made them so sure of that? With Republicans starting to openly acknowledge that the shutdown was going well for Democrats,
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Chapters
8 chapters
1
What led to the recent Democratic shutdown deal?
0:00–1:28
2
Who are the Senate Democrats involved in the shutdown agreement?
1:28–2:38
3
What challenges did Democrats face during the shutdown?
2:38–3:46
4
How did the shutdown impact the Democratic Party's strategy?
3:46–4:38
5
What negotiations took place between Senate Democrats and Republicans?
4:38–5:34
6
What provisions were included in the deal to end the shutdown?
5:34–6:54
7
How did party members react to the deal within the Democratic caucus?
6:54–8:38
8
What are the implications of this shutdown deal for future Democratic strategies?
8:38–32:51
Speakers
10 identifiedMore from The Daily
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