People are annoyed at Senate Minority Member Schumer for allowing the federal government to adopt a budget for the remainder of the federal fiscal year, which runs through the end of September. I’m annoyed at the annoyed people enough to write about it.
The budget, a CR (continuing resolution) is “dirty” rather than “clean.” Clean would level fund the government based on prior year numbers. Dirty makes some changes. The changes here include boosting the defense budget, cutting domestic discretionary spending (but doesn’t give specifics), and giving lots of freedom to the administration with how they spend within various spending buckets. I won’t belabor the point, but in my view, it’s not good governance.
Schumer did not vote for the CR. (People keep saying he did; he didn’t.) What he and 9 other Dems did was vote for cloture, which is a mechanism that stops debate on legislation so it can go to the Senate floor for a vote by that chamber in full. Only Shaheen (D-NH) and King (I-ME, technically not a Dem) voted with R’s for the CR.
Had the 10 Dems not voted for cloture, the government would’ve shutdown. Indefinitely. This would have handed on a silver platter to the administration a more rapid, permanent, and unchecked dismantling of the federal government to the administration. That’s what’s allowed in a shutdown, and Schumer should’ve been clear that Dems should not serve up that silver platter. It’s also bad governance—or at least less worse than the alternative.
Federal Dems lack power. They have some obstructive tools typical of a minority party, which are usually obstructive. But sometimes, a minority party should stand by rather than obstruct. In my view, they should protect the basics as a mark of priorities. Here, having a running government is a basic. In an upcoming fight, paying our debts is a basic.
A problem Schumer has is his message is either muddled, or not getting adequately through our modern media markets, or is not shared. Fixing this is hard. It’s more a party problem than a Schumer problem, per se. One solution, though, is if the party wants coherence, it should avoid the knee-jerk throwing of its leadership under the bus. Don’t automatically sack your own coach or quarterback, right? Maybe you want a new one? Okay. But still. Try to play like a team till then.