Democrats are very angry over the deal that ended the government shutdown

The decision by eight members of the Senate Democratic caucus to side with Republicans to advance a bill Sunday night to end the government shutdown drew heated condemnations from other members of the party and reopened longstanding divisions on how to best fight back against President Trump.

The Senate voted 60-40 to proceed to a House-passed continuing resolution to reopen the government, taking a big first step toward ending the shutdown after a group of Democrats negotiated a funding deal with Senate Republican colleagues and the White House.

Senate Democrats blocked that same House-passed bill to fund the government on 14 previous occasions. But a group of Democrats felt intense pressure to reopen the government after Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program funding expired Nov. 1 and staff shortages among air traffic controllers resulted in major delays at airports.

Eight Democrats voted to take up the House bill. The group included Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.), who will retire at the end of the year, and Sens. Jeanne Shaheen (D-N.H.) and Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.), and Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), who represents more than 144,000 federal employees in his home state.

Sen. Angus King (I-Maine), who caucuses with Democrats, also voted yes. He worked closely with Shaheen and Hassan to craft the agreement to reopen the government. Sens. John Fetterman (D-Pa.) and Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) voted to end the shutdown, as well, reflecting the position they’ve held for weeks. 

This has left many in the party, who wanted Democrats to hold out and obtain more concessions from the GOP, annoyed. Many even called the actions of the Democratic Senators “caving.”

Democratic voters clearly want their elected officials to take the fight to President Trump and the Republicans, as evidenced by their anger at Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer’s agreement to pass a clean CR bill to avoid a shutdown earlier in the year.

In an environment where Democrats want their leaders to take a no holds barred approach, any type of agreement, no matter how logical, will ruffle the feathers of many in the party.

This anger might force Democratic elected officials to continue to take an adversarial approach to the President for the foreseeable future, to placate their base.