The Speaker’s Lobby: Happy New Year as shutdown showdown draws to a close

The Senate did not drag out final passage of the interim spending bill to end the government shutdown.

Oh, you may think that happened. Especially after the Senate broke a filibuster on the bill just before 11 p.m. ET Sunday night. So why didn’t the Senate just go immediately to final passage? After all, the plan had to go to the House. Flight delays were piling up. Federal workers were at the end of their rope, going without paychecks. SNAP benefits were in limbo. So why not just step it up?

Well, it’s more complicated than that. And believe it or not, the Senate kind of did step it up.

At least from the Senate’s perspective.

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There were several Senate factions not ready to vote right away to end the shutdown last Sunday. It was clear the Senate would eventually pass the bill to fund the government. That’s to say nothing of the worsening impacts of the shutdown on a nearly hourly basis.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., was the only Republican who broke with his party and voted no on the test vote to break a filibuster on the deal to re-open the government. Paul voted nay because he wanted a change in the bill regarding hemp.

The measure prevents “unregulated sales” of “intoxicating hemp-based” products at gas stations and small retailers. It preserves the sale of non-intoxicating CBD in other hemp-related products.

So, if the Senate got 60 votes Sunday night to break the filibuster and only needs 51 to pass the bill, why was the Senate stymied by Paul or even others?

Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Okla., told reporters there was a senator asking for a vote on an amendment that would hold members’ pay in escrow during future government shutdowns. This would be in addition to Paul, asking for a vote on an amendment related to hemp policy. 

Paul’s request was previously known. But this additional ask underscores the precarious balance of any unanimous consent agreement in the Senate. Once one senator gets something, others are likely to ask for something for themselves.

Paul told reporters that he believed leadership was happy to give him his vote. But Paul said Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., blocked that for a short period.

Meanwhile, Mullin said Democrats went “radio silent” on whether they were willing to yield back debate time to speed up consideration of the bill. Any one senator could drag this process out for days, so their cooperation would be crucial in bringing the shutdown to a quick end. 

It’s about speed.

Buckle down for this next part. It gets complicated.

SENATE DEMOCRATS, REPUBLICANS REACH DEAL TO REOPEN GOVERNMENT

The vote on Sunday night was on breaking a filibuster to proceed to the original House-passed spending measure from September. That needed 60 yeas.

Therefore, the Senate had just broken a filibuster to begin work on the bill. That’s all.

By rule, the Senate can run out 30 hours of debate after breaking the filibuster, unless Paul relents. That would have gotten us to a minor procedural vote to actually get on the bill by dawn last Tuesday morning.

That is, unless there was an agreement with Paul – or for that matter – other Democratic senators to expedite things.

But wait. There’s more.

The intention of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., – and this was done with a wink and a nod to secure an agreement on Sunday – was for him to file what’s called a “substitute” amendment. A substitute simply removes the House’s old bill text and replaces it with the new spending package.

But because this is a substitute amendment, Thune must then “file cloture” to break a filibuster on that. By rule, Thune could not do that until this past Tuesday. Cloture petitions require an intervening day before ripening. So that means the Senate could not vote to break a filibuster on the substitute (e.g. the new bill) until last Thursday. Again, that needs 60 yeas. And if there was no deal, the Senate could bleed out another clock before voting yes or no on the substitute. Presumably, that would have been on Friday.

But we’re not done yet.

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If the Senate would have adopted the new text on Friday, then Thune would have had to file cloture again on the underlying bill, wait a day (Saturday) and then have a vote to break a filibuster on that (again needing 60) on Sunday.

This scenario meant that the Senate would finally pass the newly revamped spending bill on Monday. And it would mean that the House would not have tackled the bill until this coming Tuesday or Wednesday.

So that really would have stretched out the government shutdown.

That said, this was probably never going to happen. That’s just doing things by the book.

But it’s also why it was in the interest of Thune to get a deal with Paul to accelerate things. Otherwise, Paul or the Democrats who oppose the bill could have slowed things down and extended the shutdown.

But consider for a moment that if the left really wanted Democrats to stand and fight, there’s a group of core Democrats who are upset that their party relented. But then again, they had an opportunity to stretch out the shutdown and opted not to do so. There was also a smattering of Democrats who were more than happy to have others vote to open the government – even though they wanted to do so but weren’t willing to vote yes. They relied on the yes votes – or courage – of their colleagues.

And Paul was upset at the hemp provision.

“It’s really contemptuous,” said Paul of the hemp issue. “I’m not looking to hold things up. I’m looking to try to get things done.”

Paul said his “goal is to condense the time.” He got just that – a vote to strip out the hemp provision. But senators blocked it. And without significant Democratic protestations, the Senate approved the bill on Monday without deep delays.

So they didn’t really drag things out. Truth be told, most lawmakers were done with the shutdown and wanted to end it quickly – regardless of their politics.

But they’ll have another opportunity when the next round of funding expires on January 30.