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Photo: Aaron Schwartz/Bloomberg/Getty Images

When eight Senate Democrats crossed partisan lines and voted to end the longest government shutdown in U.S. history on November 9, the consensus was that they (and, perhaps privately, other congressional Democrats) believed the shutdown was no longer serving any useful purpose. It wasn’t going to move Republicans on the Obamacare subsidy extension the minority had demanded and was doing too much damage to Democratic constituencies to merit its continuance. They did get a promise from John Thune to arrange a December Senate vote on some sort of subsidy extension and perhaps hoped that Donald Trump would step in and impose a health-care compromise on his troops. That decidedly didn’t happen; a subsidy-extension bill died on the Senate floor last week with only four Republicans joining Democrats in voting for a simple extension.

The House is currently struggling toward its own vote on some kind of health-care options: likely an Obamacare-extension bill with “reforms” limiting eligibility and a non-Obamacare bill embracing various GOP health-care-cost panaceas. But there’s no way health-care legislation will actually get through Congress and across Trump’s desk before Obamacare subsidies expire on December 31 and terrible things happen to the 24 million Americans who rely on them.

Meanwhile, the stopgap spending measure that ended the earlier shutdown expires on January 30. Since very likely nothing will have happened by then to address the Obamacare-premium spike that was the ostensible reason for the last funding standoff, logic would dictate Democrats might trigger another shutdown by refusing to vote for a new spending measure (probably extending current spending levels until the end of the fiscal year in September). On the other hand, the eight Senate Democrats who ended the earlier shutdown could prevent a new one on the same grounds that there wasn’t much point to it anymore. Their party would have wrung the maximum midterm-messaging advantage on health care the minute the Obamacare subsidies expired, and a new shutdown would just muddy the waters. That’s not, however, how many other Democrats see the matter, as The Hill reports:

After Republicans defeated a Democratic bill to extend the [Obamacare] subsidies for three years, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) said the next government funding deadline is a leverage point.

“The fight is not over,” she said.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), another prominent progressive voice in the Senate Democratic Caucus, called the Republican vote against extending the enhanced subsidies “an outrage.”

Asked if Democrats should threaten another shutdown to pressure Republicans to agree to extend the subsidies, Sanders said he didn’t want to speculate but declared the expiration of tax credits “is going to result in a lot of pain for a lot of people.”

But it’s not strictly a replay of what happened in October. There’s a new variable in play because there’s a chance Congress may soon approve a good old-fashioned bipartisan appropriations bill that would protect most of the federal government from a shutdown caused by the expiration of stopgap spending, The Hill notes:

Democratic senators said Democrats would have far less leverage if the Senate appropriations package, which covers the departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor, Commerce, Justice and Interior, among other agencies, passes next month.

If President Trump signs that package into law, it would result in approximately 85 percent of the federal government being funded through September 2026, leaving Democrats much less leverage to threaten a shutdown to get Republicans to agree to an extension of the enhanced Affordable Care Act tax credits — the issue that triggered the shutdown in October.

At the same time, though, other grounds for a shutdown could be rapidly emerging over, say, a potential invasion of Venezuela or a failure by the administration to produce the Epstein files. In 2026, as in 2025, blocking government funding and threatening a government shutdown is the only real leverage Democrats will have over Republican legislative priorities or Trump’s own conduct as president. And recent Democratic electoral wins may convince many party activists it’s time to ramp up, rather than wind down, pressure tactics in Congress.

As has been the case all along, perpetually embattled Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer will be in the middle of strategic discussions over how to handle the upcoming midterm-election year. And as has been the case all along, Trump could pretty easily keep the government humming next year with some sort of health-care compromise, not that he has shown much interest in one. GOP conservatives are reportedly lusting for a new budget-reconciliation bill like the One Big Beautiful Act, which Democrats cannot filibuster. Perhaps they will try once again to “repeal and replace” Obamacare or might simply offer midterm voters more tax-cut goodies. In any event, a move in that direction may again convince Democrats that they need to reclaim control of events by something dramatic, like a government shutdown. And there are smaller variables at play as well. The current stopgap spending measure includes a ban on the federal-employee layoffs that Trump’s budget director, Russell Vought, would love to carry out as a blow to the “deep state.” Will layoffs come back into the picture on January 30?

With all these possibilities swirling around like winter snow, it will be a busy holiday season for congressional leaders, even if they’re not in session.

Another Government Shutdown May Be Just Weeks Away

Another Government Shutdown May Be Just Weeks Away