The Shutdown Is (Mostly) Over. Here’s What Actually Happened
Hey everyone, I wanted to share a quick update on the government shutdown, because I know the news has been loud and confusing, and a lot of people have been asking what actually ended it and why.
Over the weekend, the shutdown essentially came to a close after 8 Democratic Senators voted to reopen the government. In exchange, they received a promise that Congress would take up a vote on healthcare subsidies later, and that federal workers who had been furloughed would be rehired and paid back for the time they missed.
You’d think that might feel like progress, but the reaction inside the Democratic Party was the opposite. A lot of Democrats were furious, calling this a surrender. High-profile leaders were openly criticizing Chuck Schumer, saying he backed down too easily. Online, there were even polls and conversations about primarying him and replacing him with someone more aggressive.
So, why did Democrats agree to reopen the government if so many people in their own party were opposed?
The short answer: real people were getting hurt, and it wasn’t moving policy any closer to the Democrats’ goals.
Several Senators said that Republicans simply weren’t going to budge on healthcare subsidies, no matter how long the shutdown continued. Meanwhile, the impacts of the shutdown were getting worse every day:
• Over 187,000 federal workers in Virginia alone weren’t getting paychecks.
• The federal employee union (which originally supported the shutdown) publicly changed course and asked Democrats to end it.
• SNAP (food stamp) benefits were becoming uncertain for millions of families.
• Flights were being canceled as FAA staff left or went unpaid.
• Many workers had already been laid off.
That’s when it became clear the shutdown wasn’t applying pressure to change policy, it was just hurting everyday people.
So the shutdown ended not because Democrats “gave up,” but because the cost to families, workers, and basic government functions was too high to justify continuing. The only reason someone might argue it should have continued is if they genuinely believed that Republicans were about to cave on healthcare. But the opposite happened. Trump actually dug in harder over the weekend.
Some people think Schumer also made the call because the Senators who voted to reopen the government aren’t up for reelection next year, meaning they could take the political heat. There’s probably some truth to that. But at the end of the day, the decision came down to recognizing that the shutdown wasn’t going to achieve the policy goal and was actively damaging the country.
Personally, I think ending it was the right decision. Shutdowns rarely (if ever) deliver the policy outcomes people hope for, but they do create real-world harm. If the goal is to have a functioning government and things like reliable air travel, working food assistance programs, and federal employees being paid then reopening made sense.
What concerns me more is the reaction. The loudest voices right now are calling for more aggression, more fighting, more “never back down.” But governing isn’t just about winning fights — it’s about making difficult choices and protecting the people who get caught in the middle.
There’s a difference between leadership and just being loud. And I hope, going forward, we choose the former.