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When a group of Senate Democrats helped pass a government funding bill in March, it caused a major fissure within the party, with the base itching
to fight the Trump administration even if it came at the cost of a
shutdown.

But just over a month later, President Donald Trump’s tariff policy has resulted in historic swings in the stock market and levels of economic uncertainty that are now landing squarely on his shoulders. And the
Democrats who were criticized for keeping the government open are now
feeling vindicated.

“I was right,” Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, who caucuses with Democrats, told
NBC News of his vote to keep the government open.

“I concluded, along with others, that a shutdown would actually further
empower Trump and Musk to pursue what they’re doing,” King said. “We would
have handed him a gift. Anything bad that happened to the economy would
have been blamed on us.”

The 10 Senate Democrats who voted with Republicans to advance a six-month funding bill largely did so because of the uncertainty a government
shutdown would bring, particularly in the face of the sweeping cuts being implemented by Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency.

Many Democrats feared that those federal workers who were sidelined during
the lapse in funding would be targeted for firings as soon as the
government was reopened, or that the reopening would be done in a
piecemeal fashion, creating a chaotic and painful fight in Congress over
which programs needed to be reinstated and which could wait.

“We’d be deciding what we’re going to do with the shutdown or how we’re
going to handle that,” Sen. Gary Peters, D-Mich., told NBC News of what
would have happened if they voted to block the funding bill.

“The main reason why I felt very strongly that we wouldn’t have a shutdown
is that by having a shutdown you basically ceded power to the president,”
he said.

Deep Democratic divisions
Many of the Democrats who voted to avert a shutdown faced an outspoken
group of activists, voters and fellow lawmakers who saw the funding bill
as one of their only points of leverage. While Republicans control the
White House and both chambers of Congress, funding legislation still
requires 60 votes in the Senate, giving Democrats the ability to block
bills in protest.

“I got my ass kicked in,” Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., told NBC News. “How
would that look right now, if the government would be on fire and closed
for a month because of what we would have done?”

“We would be owning that,” Fetterman said.

Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., added, “I think the decision vindicated
itself.”

“But I think it does point out one of the reasons that I explained to
people who asked me about it was that if the economy went south, that the president would blame the Democrats, and that was not in anybody’s
interest,” she said.

But Democrats who voted to block the funding bill say they still feel
their strategy was the right one.

“I don’t think we should have supported that [continuing resolution], and
I don’t think we should support a CR in the future unless it commits the administration to following the law,” Sen. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., told NBC News. “There’s no way I can vote to give them continued free rein to do
that.”

Sen. Peter Welch, D-Vt., who voted against the funding bill, said he found
the vote to be particularly vexing, telling NBC News: “That was one of
those votes where I voted the way I thought was the right vote, but I
couldn’t tell you with certainty that I was confident I was right.”

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/senate-democrats-took-heat- government-shutdown-vote-now-vindicated-rcna201446

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