Senate: ‘We will vote today to re-open the government’

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced Monday that he and Senate GOP leaders have reached a deal to reopen the government, and the chamber is on track to pass a plan to keep the government funded for three weeks.

“We will vote today to reopen the government,” Schumer said on the Senate floor, saying he and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell had reached an “arrangement.” The Senate is now voting on the proposal to keep the government open until February 8 and it is expected to pass.

The movement comes thanks in part to commitments from McConnell and other Republicans in bipartisan meetings, according to four Democratic sources. Those sources say at least three Democratic senators who were no’s before now plan to vote yes.

After the bill passes through the Senate, it will then go back to the House. House GOP lawmakers are largely united and it is expected to pass. But without a guarantee that the House will take up the expiring Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi is planning to vote no, according to a senior Democratic source. That source said a large chunk of Democratic caucus is expected to remain opposed, but GOP leaders feel confident they won’t need much help approving the latest stopgap bill.

The vote comes several hours after the workday for hundreds of thousands of furloughed federal employees was supposed to have begun, and it comes three days after the government officially shut down Friday at midnight. Many of the shutdown’s full effects were less visible during the weekend, when much of the federal workforce would typically be off anyway.

“I don’t think this is the right way to get policy outcomes is to shut the government down. When we tried it, it didn’t work well for us,” GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina told reporters, appearing alongside GOP Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Jeff Flake of Arizona. “Here’s what I predict. Once we start talking about immigration and voting on immigration, we’ll find 60 votes to make sure these DACA recipients’ lives are not ruined by March 5.”

The Senate vote was moved from 1 a.m. ET Monday to noon after it became clear Democrats would block the spending bill over disagreements on a variety of issues, most notably what do about young people affected by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn of Texas said he thought Schumer of New York agreed to push back the vote to give his caucus “a chance to chew” on a GOP proposal to break the impasse.

“It’s better to have a successful vote tomorrow at noon than a failed vote tonight,” Cornyn told reporters.

A senior Republican aide told CNN Monday that McConnell wasn’t planning to provide any firmer commitment on immigration than he already has.

“If that’s not enough for Democrats, then we’re in this for the long haul,” the aide said. “If it’s enough for Flake, and Graham, and Collins — who want this done as much as they do — it should be enough for Democrats.”

Flake said Sunday night he was now a “yes” on the funding bill and it was his hope that six or seven more moderate Democrats would come on board to get the continuing resolution over the finish line — to 60 votes — to end the shutdown.

He said the Democrats still want something tangible on DACA but said it was problematic because it could run into the February 8 funding deadline.

He argued that they won a concession from McConnell that he isn’t requiring President Donald Trump to sign off before an immigration bill moves to the floor.

“For the first time, we have the majority leader move off of we can only move something if the President agrees,” Flake told reporters.

Earlier Sunday, Trump called for Senate Republicans to change the chamber’s rules to resolve the funding impasse as the government shutdown continued into its second day. He tweeted a call for McConnell to invoke the so-called “nuclear option” and thereby remove leverage for Senate Democrats.

Senate rules impose a threshold of 60 votes to break a filibuster, and Senate Republicans currently hold a slim majority of 51 votes, meaning even if they can unite their members, they need nine more votes to end debate. The White House is calling for the Senate to change its rules and move the threshold to a simple majority of 51 votes.

A spokesman for McConnell said in response to the tweet that the Senate Republican Conference does not support changing the 60-vote rule, a reiteration of Republican Senate leadership’s already-stated opposition to the move Trump has called for over the past year.

This story has been updated and will continue to update with new developments Monday.