The Trump administration finally unleashed one of its most aggressive maneuvers in the hopes of forcing Democrats to stop filibustering the continuing resolution that would fund the federal government and end the Schumer Shutdown: mass federal layoffs—officially called “reductions in force” (RIFs). After weeks of warning, the hammer has fallen. Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought announced bluntly on Friday: “The RIFs have begun.”
Yet that hasn’t stopped Democrats from trying to pin the blame for the shutdown on Republicans. According to recent reports, they’re convinced the stalemate is politically working in their favor—and they’ve vowed not to give in “short of planes falling out of the sky.”
Meanwhile, military families are turning to food banks just to put meals on the table. But Democrats seem perfectly content to let them struggle, so long as they believe the optics help their cause. Some polls suggest the strategy might be paying off. Others say it’s backfiring.
But as a recent exchange on CNN’s NewsNight made clear, one simple question cuts through all the political theater and gets to the heart of the question of who is really to blame for the shutdown: Who’s actually voting against reopening the government?
Host Abby Phillip framed the debate by asking Rep. Marilyn Strickland (D-Wash.) how long Democrats were prepared to “absorb the pain” of the shutdown, noting that “those 4,000 workers probably won’t get their jobs back after this, because this is what Russ Vought and President Trump have wanted to do all along.”
Strickland agreed, insisting Republicans were entirely to blame. “You’re actually right, Abby. This is what they’ve wanted to do all along,” she said. “They started firing people in February. So this idea that this is something new that they’re doing is not necessarily true. They were going to fire people no matter what happened.” She added, “The Republicans control the House, the Republicans control the Senate, the Republicans control the White House. So any shutdown that we have is 100 percent on them. They fully own this.”
For our VIPs: Shutdowns Put the Democrats' Real Priorities on Full Display
We’ve heard this line a lot over the the past week and a half, and I suspect there are plenty of people on the left who buy into it, because they don’t understand how the Senate works. But CNN senior political commentator Scott Jennings put it in the most simple terms. He pressed Strickland to confront the actual cause of the stalemate: “Who’s voting against the continuing resolution in the Senate right now? Which party’s voting against it?”
Strickland dodged the question, arguing that Republicans should be doing more to “offer an olive branch” to Democrats. “There’s no desire to do that on the part of the Republicans who have the majority,” she said.
Jennings fired back, pointing out that Democrats were blocking the same spending measure they’d previously supported. “So basically, she won’t say it,” he remarked. “The Democratic Party is refusing to vote for a continuing resolution in the Senate that they voted for 13 times when Joe Biden was the president.”
Democrat Rep Marilyn Strickland gets called out by Scott Jennings for lying about who is responsible for the government shutdown.
— Thomas Hern (@ThomasMHern) October 11, 2025
"Any shutdown that we have is 100% on the GOP. They fully own this."
"Who's voting against the continuing resolution in the Senate right now?" pic.twitter.com/6plSl2bN7Y
The truth is simple: Republicans passed a bill to reopen the government. Democrats are filibustering it. By moving forward with RIFs, Trump and OMB Director Russ Vought have exposed the game for what it is—a cynical, partisan shutdown driven by Democrats more interested in political theater than serving the American people.
Democrats have nobody to blame for the Schumer Shutdown but themselves. Chuck Schumer led the charge to close the government for illegals’ healthcare—and then smugly declared, “every day gets better for us.” That’s what he thinks of the pain he’s caused. Help us reveal the truth—use promo code POTUS47 for 74% off your VIP membership.
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