No. of Recommendations: 4
I think the Democrats should have said they would only support a CR if full funding, including restoring full staffing and offices, for the Social Security Administration, Veterans Affairs, and Medicare.
But that's not the status quo - so they'd get killed for trying to get that into the CR. The CR doesn't change anything about the status quo for staffing and offices. If the existing law requires a certain level of staffing or offices, the CR wouldn't affect that. Everything continues.
What the Democrats would have liked is to have new language added to the CR that would reign in DOGE. They want a new law that puts new limits on the Executive's power over those agencies. But that's not what CR's generally do. They preserve the status quo, not include new substantive policy changes.
So you run right into the trap of "holding the government hostage" rhetoric. If you've lost the Presidential election and you're in the minority in Congress, you don't get to have your policy choices put in place. You're not in charge. And the voters hate when you try to hold up a must-pass funding provision as a way to get leverage to force a policy that you don't have the votes to put in place through conventional channels.
The GOP would eat the Democrats' lunch on that. If what Trump is doing ends up being unpopular, then the GOP will pay the price at that time - but the CR itself doesn't have anything unpopular in it, and the GOP will crucify the Democrats for causing a shutdown over a bill that itself doesn't have anything they can point to that's worth shutting the government over.
