Democrats Betting That Americans Won’t Wise Up to Their Shutdown Games
10th November 2025
Believing they’re “winning” the government shutdown, Democrats are playing a dangerous game of chicken, aiming to keep on exploiting the public’s misdirected ire — without it being turned on them.
Yet what’s already a record-long federal closure could blow up in their faces if their scheming means millions of Americans can’t see grandma at Thanksgiving.
Even though it’s the Dems refusing to let the government reopen, Senate and House Minority Leaders Chuck Schumer and Hakeem Jeffries & Co. bet that voters would finger Republicans for gumming up the works.
The gamble seemingly paid off Tuesday, as Democrats outperformed expectations in Virginia and New Jersey; at least some polls also show the public blaming the GOP more.
Most Americans don’t look past who’s in charge of the House, Senate and White House to grasp how the filibuster lets the minority party block the bill to fund federal operations, and of course much of the media is happy to frame Republicans as villains who don’t care if SNAP recipients can’t eat or furloughed federal workers can’t pay their bills.