Republicans Bend, but Don’t Break, on the Shutdown
Despite defections from key GOP senators, the upper chamber rejected two proposals to reopen the government, injecting a new sense of desperation into stagnant negotiations.
Updated on January 24 at 4:51 p.m. ET
The shutdown will go on.
Competing proposals to reopen the federal government each garnered majority support in the Senate on Thursday afternoon, but both failed to secure the necessary 60 votes to break an impasse that has dragged on for more than a month and cut off pay for 800,000 public employees.
The votes were technically procedural in nature, to end debate and move to final passage on both measures. But their twin defeat sent the same sobering message: More than a month of shuttered federal agencies and a mounting financial toll on well over 1 million employees and contractors have not been enough to forge consensus or a compromise in the Republican-led Senate. Bills passed by
