November 10, 2025 • 21 mins
1. 🏛️ Government Shutdown Status
- The government had been shut down for 40 days, the longest in U.S. history.
- A Senate vote secured 60 votes (including 8 Democrats) to begin the reopening process.
- The continuing resolution (CR) will fund the government through January 30, avoiding a holiday-season funding crisis.
2. ⚙️ Reopening Process
- Despite the vote, procedural delays (e.g., Senate rules requiring 60 votes and time gaps between votes) mean the government may not fully reopen until Tuesday or Wednesday.
- Unanimous consent could have expedited the process, but some Democrats (e.g., Bernie Sanders) were accused of obstructing.
3. ✈️ Impact on Travel and Public Services
- TSA agents and air traffic controllers were working without pay, leading to sick-outs and flight delays.
- Even after reopening, normal operations may take several days to resume.
4. 📜 Legislation Introduced
-
Deporting Fraudsters Act of 2025:
- Would make welfare fraud by illegal immigrants a deportable offense.
- Cites statistics on non-citizens receiving SNAP and WIC benefits.
- Claims a 10-year cost of $15 billion due to illegal immigrant access to benefits.
-
Obamacare Subsidies Debate:
- Discussion on expiring subsidies for health insurance companies.
- Republicans agreed to a vote in early December on whether to extend these subsidies.
- Cruz and Trump oppose the subsidies, calling them corporate welfare, and advocate for Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) instead.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all the
Democrats who are running for president that want to want
a spectacle, and so that if they really decide to
be just just fully obstructionist, they could drag it as
late as funding.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
You're listening to the forty seven Morning Update with Ben ferguson.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Good Monday morning.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Nice to have you with us on the forty seven
Morning Update.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
And there's just one big story.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
The government is still shut down, but we're moving closer
to getting it back open. Why is it taking so long?
Senator Cruz joins me to talk about exactly what's happening
on the floor of the Senate as we speak. And
Democrats could have opened the government Sunday night, they decided
(00:46):
on purpose to drag their feet. How long could this last?
How much is it gonna affect your life and travel?
Speaker 3 (00:54):
This week? We answer all of those questions.
Speaker 4 (00:57):
But first, I want to tell you about an amazing
opportunity right now that I'm involved in and I cannot
wait for you to take advantage of it. I want
you to take some incredible courses at Hillsdale College for free.
You may not know this, but Hillsdale College has been
influencing conservatives like myself for decades. They had a huge
(01:19):
impact on Charlie Kirk's life, and even as memorial service,
they talked about how Charlie took class after class after
class at Hillsdale College. Hillsdale College is now offering for you,
the listeners of this show, more than forty free I
want to say that again, free online courses. That's right,
(01:40):
more than forty free online courses. You can learn about
the works of C. S. Lewis, the stories in the
Book of Genesis, the meaning of the US Constitution, the
rise and fall of the Roman Republic, or the history
of the ancient Christian Church, all with Hillsdale College's free
online courses. Right now, I'm personally taking the Constitution one
(02:03):
oh one, and this course you're going to exploit the
design and the purpose of the Constitution, the challenge is
it faced during the Civil War and how it has
been undermined for more than a century by radical progressives
and liberals.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
This twelve lecture course is self pace.
Speaker 4 (02:21):
It's another reason why I love it so start whenever
and wherever in our country. We need more Americans like
you and I than understand the Constitution and can defend
the freedom of the American people against the left, and
they're increasing encroachments on our God given rights. So start
your classes today for free. Start your free Constitution one
(02:43):
oh one course right now. How do you do it?
Go to Hillsdale dot edu slash Morning Update to enroll
and it's no cost.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
It's easy to get started.
Speaker 4 (02:56):
You got to use a special website Hillsdale dot e
slash Morning Update in role for free hill Zil dot
eedu slash Morning Update. It's the forty seven Morning Update
and it starts right now.
Speaker 5 (03:10):
Story number one.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
All right, So Center, there was a lot of excitement
earlier Sunday evening. My phone blew up. I'm assuming you
were getting the text. It's like, oh great, the government's
wide open again. It's gonna go back to normal. I
wish that was true. You just described it as we've
got the votes to move forward. Explain the process, because
(03:32):
i mean even on social media it was like the
government's reopened. I'm like, not so fast, that's not how
this can work. In fact, they could take almost another
week and totally get this thing back to where it
needs to be.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
So look, the good news is we finally have a
deal and we got the votes that are necessary to
reopen the government. So we've had a shutdown, the schumber shutdown.
Speaker 5 (03:53):
For forty days. Yeah, fourteen different times.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Fourteen times Republicans have voted to open the government. Eighteen
times Democrats have voted no, have voted to keep the
government shut down. Now, remember, the entire reason that we
have a shutdown is because under the Senate rules, you
need sixty votes to move to proceed to legislation funding
the government. We only have fifty three Republicans. That means
(04:18):
we need at least seven Democrats, and unfortunately ran votes
no on all of these, so we have fifty two
Republicans to fund the government.
Speaker 5 (04:27):
So we need eight Democrats.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
The fourteen times we voted over the last forty days,
over and over and over again, we've gotten at most
two or three Democrats. Tonight Sunday, it's just a few
minutes after ten pm Sunday night, we finally got the
eight Democrats we needed. So the Democrats who voted to
reopen the government are Durban, Hassen, King, Cortes, Masto, Cain, Shaheen, Rosen,
(04:53):
and Fetterman. Those are the eight we got exactly what
we needed. We ended up with sixty votes, not sixty one,
so that not in a sink. Every other Democrat voted no.
Keep it shut down. But getting eight is important, and
there was a substantive deal. But the substantive deal has
several pieces. Number One, there's a continuing Resolution that runs
(05:14):
through January thirtieth. So one thing that was really important
to me and to a lot of conservatives was that
we not have government funding expire right before Christmas. Often
government fundings expires right before Christmas, and they use the
desire everyone has to go home to their families for
the holidays to twist their arms into passing a really
(05:37):
bad bill. So this does not end right before Christmas.
The CR Instead, the Continuing Resolution continues until the end
of January. That was significant. We also included three appropriation
bills in the deals. Now these are appropriation bills. There
are two ways you can fund the government. You can
fund the government through an appropriation bill. They're thirteen different
(05:58):
appropriation bills that fund different cabinet agencies in different major programs. Yep,
those take sixty votes. That's what's called regular order. That's
the way the system is supposed to work. And then
you could also fund the government through a continuing resolution
also called a CR that just keeps everything the way
it was before and maintains the status quo. We ended
(06:21):
up doing a combination of both. So in this deal
we have number one, the ag approach, So that's the
agriculture appropriation that includes the funds that farmers rely on,
but it also importantly includes SNAP. It includes food stamps.
So one of the consequences of the shutdown was the
funding for food stamps went away. With this appropriation bill,
(06:44):
we will fund the food stamps for an entire year,
so that will be taken off the table.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And by the way, let's be very clear about that.
Speaker 4 (06:51):
Republicans tried to make sure that even with the government shutdown,
that SNAP benefits were continuing and were not stopped. Democrats
made damn sure that people did not get their food
stent benefits during the forty day the longest shut down
in American history. They did that because they thought it
was leveraged to hurt the poorest among us in America,
(07:13):
and that would then give them leverage to get more
of the port rail things they wanted for the Democratic
programs and initiatives. And they didn't care if you couldn't
feed your kids over the last forty days.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
So understand that was the entire Democrat strategy is maximize
the pain on the American people because the more pain
that they could inflict, they were counting on the media
to be dishonest and blame it all on Trump, and
so repeatedly this past week, I went back and forth
with Democrats repeatedly, and their talking points were very simple.
They would say, well, you have a Republican president, of
(07:44):
Republican Senate, Republican House. The shutdown is their fault, and
that was it. And they were counting on the dishonest
corporate media to tell that lie what they omitted. And
actually I talked about this just this weekend. I spoke
on the Senate Florida. I said, look, whenever anyone takes
an oath to testify in court, that they put their
(08:06):
hand on the Bible and they pledge to tell the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Well, the
Democrats saying that they're failing part number two, the whole truth,
because it is true we have a Republican president, House
and Senate. What they're ignoring is the fact that it
requires sixty votes and it is the Democrats who force
the shutdown because they're the ones that are not voting
to keep the government open. This package, we took three
(08:27):
appropriations bills. The ag Appropriation Bill which is farmers, ranchers
and food stamps, the Military Construction and the VA Bill,
so that funds funds our veterans and also gives funds
for military construction projects across the country. And then the
Legislature Bill, which, among other things, we increase the funding
(08:48):
for security for members of Congress. Given the political violence
we see, I think that's very important to have more
funds to increase security on both.
Speaker 5 (08:57):
Sides of the aisle.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
So that package, those are three appropriation bills that were bipartisan.
The Democrats had a party in that were passed along
with the thirty day CR or not thirty day the
CR to January thirtieth.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Right, Henry thirtieth.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, yeah, So all of that is what we got
sixty votes for tonight. Now what does that mean tomorrow morning?
Does that mean the government is opened Monday morning? Unfortunately No.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
And by the way, people are frustrated because they think, well,
you guys shut it down quickly, then why can't you
just reopen it quickly, and this is how the sausage
is made. And that's why I think there's some miscommunication
on Sunday night about.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Oh, the government's like open up.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
I mean, there was major news out it's like government
opening up, the votes to have it, and they're thinking,
all right, well, if I'm flying out Monday or Monday
afternoon or Tuesday, there should be no problems at the airport.
That's also not true. I want to be very clear
about that.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Look, if the Democrats want to be full obstructionist, they
could delay opening the government as late as Friday of
this week. Really, because there are a series of votes
we have to take in. Under the Senate rules, they
can delay thing. They have a right to an intervening
day between one voter and another. They can delay things
for thirty hours, and so they could drag it out.
(10:16):
Even though we have the sixty votes. They could drag
it out as late as Friday. My guess is they'll
drag it out till Monday or Tuesday. My best guess
is the government will open up Tuesday or Wednesday. But
we really are dealing with Look the Bernie Sanders Is
of the world. By the way, Chuck Schumer voted no
because the whole point of this was for him to
(10:39):
tell the crazy left he still hates Donald Trump. Now,
I don't think these eight Democrats would have voted yes
without Schumer blessing their voting yes. So this was always
going to end this one.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
I was going to ask you, so getting to the
perfect number of eight, and again, this is how the
sausage is made. So let's talk about behind the scenes.
You guys, the Repubublicans have been meeting right behind the scenes.
You have your normal lunches that you have in your
other meetings, and I see you guys on the four
of the Senate talking and you're outside of the Senate.
I mean Democrats are doing the same thing when they
(11:12):
decide who is in the eight to vote yes? Is
that strategic based on who needs cover when they're running
for office?
Speaker 5 (11:19):
Is that?
Speaker 4 (11:19):
I mean there's some like Fetterman that clearly were leaders
on this, just saying I think it's wrong to hold
the American be hostage.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
I'm voting to open this thing up.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
How do they decide on the exact eight and is
it literally to the point where they're like, all right,
we're going to only give eight and you got to
make your argument to us why you should be in
the eight and we'll give you that blessing.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
How does that work?
Speaker 5 (11:42):
So I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
I will say there were a number of Republicans who
were surprised we did not get more than eight. So
there were other Democrats who were telling Republicans privately they
were going to vote yes to open the government. People
like John Ossoff, who's got he's the most vulnerable Democrat
running for reelection in Georgia. He just voted the fifteenth
time to keep the government shut down, you know, George.
(12:06):
By the way, Raphael Warnock, the other Georgia senator, did
as well. We actually thought there was a real possibility
they would both vote tonight to open the government. I
don't know what Osof's calculus was. Warnock will often vote
with Osof to give him some political coverage, so we
figured that they would go They would go either both
yes or both no. They both voted to keep the
(12:27):
government shut down.
Speaker 4 (12:29):
What is the chances to guys like that on Tuesday
Wednesday vote yes? After they say all right, well fine,
we're already going to be there. Does that change you
think that eight number could that change at tenth p
or is it pretty much a eight no.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I could easily see on a subsequent vote. Some additional Democrats,
Patty Murray, who is the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee,
a number of Republicans believe she was going to vote yes.
I mentioned we just were going to pass three appropriation bills.
She played a major hand in drafting those reappropriation bills.
And so for appropriators. Look, when Chuck Schumer and the
(13:04):
Democrats had the majority, do you know how many appropriation
bills they passed into law?
Speaker 4 (13:09):
How many?
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Zero?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Like the process was broken, they didn't do appropriations. It's
our hope to actually go through the process, to have amendments,
to negotiate it. And that's what these three bills are doing.
And yet the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee voted no.
Chris Coons, who is widely seen as one of the
more moderate Democrats. He voted to keep the government shut down.
(13:36):
Alissa Slotkin from Michigan. Look, Michigan's a purple state. She
voted to keep the government shut down. Gary Peters, also
from Michigan retiring, he voted to keep the government to
shut down. So there were there were another half dozen
or so that a lot of folks thought we would
have a chance at getting their votes, and we did not.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
So when you don't get those votes, we move forward.
You said this thing could end up to Friday. You're
guessing probably Tuesday, Wednesday the government reopens.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
How many more votes after tonight?
Speaker 4 (14:06):
Again, for people that are listening, we're doing this Sunday
night at ten fifteen right now in DC. How many
people are How many votes will it take starting now
to get the government actually reopen.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
We need to continue to hold sixty, but we're going
to the underlying terms of the deal have been cut.
So I don't expect any of the eight who just
voted yes to flip. So I think we've got our sixty.
But the remaining Democrats can just drag things out and
make it painful. I hope they don't. I actually pulled
Dick Durbin aside. Durbin is retiring, and I mentioned I
(14:43):
always thought this was going to end with retiring Democrats
voting to open the government. Durbin did so. Now, look,
he's the number two in leadership among the Democrats. He's
Chuck Schumer's right hand buddy's retiring. I told Dick tonight,
I said, look, we've got sixty now. It sure would
be nice if, like you guys didn't drag this out
unnecessarily till Friday, and just the identical outcome will happen,
(15:07):
and it just is more painful for everybody. I think
there are a lot of Democrats who feel that way.
It's why I think we'll end tuesday or Wednesday. But
who the heck knows. Now, there's another element to this
deal that's getting some attention online, which is a commitment
to reverse the rifts, the reductions and forces that happened
(15:28):
during the shutdown. Yeah, and there's some folks online saying, oh,
you guys cave, this is terrible. That was an offer
that President Trump made, I think like two weeks ago
to the Democrats that has been on the table for
them a long long time, and the White House made
the decision, Okay, if you guys open the government, we agree,
(15:48):
we'll offer you that will reverse those rifts. So that
was in the deal, But it was a deal that
came from the White House that we just agreed. Okay,
if that's if those are the terms that the President
wants to cut, we'll back up the president.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
So you go into Monday, you're going to have more
meetings throughout the day, or explain to me Monday what
that looks like.
Speaker 1 (16:07):
We're anticipating the first vote probably around noon. And as
I said that, there could be we could have done
it all tonight if the Democrats had agreed to In
the Senate, you can do anything by unanimous consent, and
so if they wanted to open the government tonight, they
could have just consented to do one vote and then
do the other one next to the other, one next,
the other one next, and we'd be done.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
Like you can do that.
Speaker 4 (16:28):
You know, literally, instead of us recording right now, you
guys could actually be voting and this could have all
been Monday morning. The government is open for business, all
the fa guys are back to normal, everybody's getting paid,
and they're like, now, screwt, We'll just wait a few
more days. So no one's flying home, right, I mean,
you're not flying home tonight, are you?
Speaker 5 (16:47):
Nope?
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Nope, I'm in DC. I didn't see my family this weekend.
I would have loved to have seen my kids. I didn't.
I spent most of the time just sitting here waiting
for Democrats to finally agree to cut a deal, but
it was striking. We could have done it tonight, but
to do that you need unanimous consent. That means you
(17:10):
don't need sixty you need one hundred. That means one
person can object and say no, drag it out.
Speaker 5 (17:17):
I want to burn more time. I want to burn
more time.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
And you have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all
the Democrats who are running for president that want to
want a spectacle, and so that if they really decide
to be just just fully obstructionist, they could drag it
as late as Friday.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
All right.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
So one other question is this is unfolding. When the
government opens back up, and let's just use a hypothetical
of Wednesday, all right, Wednesday the government opens up, does
that mean that instantly the system is going to go
back to normal. I'm saying this to people traveling. You
and I have traveled a lot. We've started to see
the breakdown of air traffic control and of having to
(18:02):
cancel flights. I've witnessed it traveling internationally and domestically over
the last couple of days.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
You've done it as well.
Speaker 4 (18:09):
And so when it opens back up, is that like
an instant fix or is that gonna take a couple
of days to cycle through the system as well? What
does travel look like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Look at least travel Monday and Monday and Tuesday, I
would expect still really significant delays and really significant cancelations.
The reason for those delays and those cancelations. We have
roughly fifty thousand TSA agents all across the country. Many
of them are going into work. None of them are
being paid. They all missed their last paycheck, didn't get
(18:43):
their last paycheck. We have roughly fourteen thousand air traffic controllers.
Many of them are going into work. None of them
are getting paid. They all missed their last paycheck. Listen,
if you're a TSA agent, if you're an air traffic controller,
typical TSA agent or air traffic controller doesn't have a
deep reservoir of savings. I mean, they're under real stress
(19:04):
right now. How do I pay my mortgage, how do
I pay my rent? How do I pay my bills?
And so what is happening with both TSA agents and controllers.
They're calling in sick, They're just not showing up, say summer,
coming into work. The problem is in New York City
on Halloween Day, roughly eighty percent of the controllers called
in sick and didn't show up to work. That's Chuck
(19:25):
Schumer's hometown, by the way. And so we're seeing with TSA.
You had Monday a week ago, the lines in the
Houston Bush Airport were two and a half to three
hours lined long to get through security because they were
so short staffed on TSA agents they didn't have enough
to move people through security. So even if the government
(19:47):
opens up tomorrow, you're dealing with the independent decisions of
fifty thousand TSA agents and fourteen thousand controllers when they
come back to work. And the reason that the FAA
has mandated ten percent flights be canceled is they're looking
at the data and seeing that these short staffed air
traffic controllers there's an increased risk to safety. So they're saying,
(20:08):
all right, if we don't have full staffing, we got
to reduce the number of flights. So in a week,
do I expect things to go back to normal? Yes,
a week after things open up, but it could easily
take several days for people to say, Okay, I'm going
to come back into work now. That doesn't happen automatically
just by flipping a switch.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
So what you're.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
Basically telling me is this week, when I'm flying, and
when you're flying, and so many others that listen to
this show are flying, we're going to be dealing with
this type of chaos because the Democrats decided not to
do their job even while doing their job on Sunday
night right now.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Yes, and by the way, they could have agreed to
open it all up tonight that they could have given consent,
said okay, you've got a deal, let's move ahead, and
it's now just the obstructionist who you know. If your
flight is canceled tomorrow, you could thank Chuck Schumer and
every Democrat senator running for president who's trying to show
off to the crazy left. But we will get it
(21:08):
open now, but it will take it'll take a few
more days.
Speaker 5 (21:12):
In a middle.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Thank you for listening to the forty seven Morning Update
with Ben Ferguson. Please make sure you hit subscribe wherever
you're listening to this podcast right now and for more
in depth news, also subscribe to the Ben Ferguson podcast
and we will see you back here tomorrow,
You have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all the
Democrats who are running for president that want to want
a spectacle, and so that if they really decide to
be just just fully obstructionist, they could drag it as
late as funding.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
You're listening to the forty seven Morning Update with Ben ferguson.
Speaker 3 (00:19):
Good Monday morning.
Speaker 4 (00:20):
Nice to have you with us on the forty seven
Morning Update.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
And there's just one big story.
Speaker 4 (00:26):
The government is still shut down, but we're moving closer
to getting it back open. Why is it taking so long?
Senator Cruz joins me to talk about exactly what's happening
on the floor of the Senate as we speak. And
Democrats could have opened the government Sunday night, they decided
(00:46):
on purpose to drag their feet. How long could this last?
How much is it gonna affect your life and travel?
Speaker 3 (00:54):
This week? We answer all of those questions.
Speaker 4 (00:57):
But first, I want to tell you about an amazing
opportunity right now that I'm involved in and I cannot
wait for you to take advantage of it. I want
you to take some incredible courses at Hillsdale College for free.
You may not know this, but Hillsdale College has been
influencing conservatives like myself for decades. They had a huge
(01:19):
impact on Charlie Kirk's life, and even as memorial service,
they talked about how Charlie took class after class after
class at Hillsdale College. Hillsdale College is now offering for you,
the listeners of this show, more than forty free I
want to say that again, free online courses. That's right,
(01:40):
more than forty free online courses. You can learn about
the works of C. S. Lewis, the stories in the
Book of Genesis, the meaning of the US Constitution, the
rise and fall of the Roman Republic, or the history
of the ancient Christian Church, all with Hillsdale College's free
online courses. Right now, I'm personally taking the Constitution one
(02:03):
oh one, and this course you're going to exploit the
design and the purpose of the Constitution, the challenge is
it faced during the Civil War and how it has
been undermined for more than a century by radical progressives
and liberals.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
This twelve lecture course is self pace.
Speaker 4 (02:21):
It's another reason why I love it so start whenever
and wherever in our country. We need more Americans like
you and I than understand the Constitution and can defend
the freedom of the American people against the left, and
they're increasing encroachments on our God given rights. So start
your classes today for free. Start your free Constitution one
(02:43):
oh one course right now. How do you do it?
Go to Hillsdale dot edu slash Morning Update to enroll
and it's no cost.
Speaker 3 (02:54):
It's easy to get started.
Speaker 4 (02:56):
You got to use a special website Hillsdale dot e
slash Morning Update in role for free hill Zil dot
eedu slash Morning Update. It's the forty seven Morning Update
and it starts right now.
Speaker 5 (03:10):
Story number one.
Speaker 4 (03:11):
All right, So Center, there was a lot of excitement
earlier Sunday evening. My phone blew up. I'm assuming you
were getting the text. It's like, oh great, the government's
wide open again. It's gonna go back to normal. I
wish that was true. You just described it as we've
got the votes to move forward. Explain the process, because
(03:32):
i mean even on social media it was like the
government's reopened. I'm like, not so fast, that's not how
this can work. In fact, they could take almost another
week and totally get this thing back to where it
needs to be.
Speaker 1 (03:43):
So look, the good news is we finally have a
deal and we got the votes that are necessary to
reopen the government. So we've had a shutdown, the schumber shutdown.
Speaker 5 (03:53):
For forty days. Yeah, fourteen different times.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Fourteen times Republicans have voted to open the government. Eighteen
times Democrats have voted no, have voted to keep the
government shut down. Now, remember, the entire reason that we
have a shutdown is because under the Senate rules, you
need sixty votes to move to proceed to legislation funding
the government. We only have fifty three Republicans. That means
(04:18):
we need at least seven Democrats, and unfortunately ran votes
no on all of these, so we have fifty two
Republicans to fund the government.
Speaker 5 (04:27):
So we need eight Democrats.
Speaker 1 (04:30):
The fourteen times we voted over the last forty days,
over and over and over again, we've gotten at most
two or three Democrats. Tonight Sunday, it's just a few
minutes after ten pm Sunday night, we finally got the
eight Democrats we needed. So the Democrats who voted to
reopen the government are Durban, Hassen, King, Cortes, Masto, Cain, Shaheen, Rosen,
(04:53):
and Fetterman. Those are the eight we got exactly what
we needed. We ended up with sixty votes, not sixty one,
so that not in a sink. Every other Democrat voted no.
Keep it shut down. But getting eight is important, and
there was a substantive deal. But the substantive deal has
several pieces. Number One, there's a continuing Resolution that runs
(05:14):
through January thirtieth. So one thing that was really important
to me and to a lot of conservatives was that
we not have government funding expire right before Christmas. Often
government fundings expires right before Christmas, and they use the
desire everyone has to go home to their families for
the holidays to twist their arms into passing a really
(05:37):
bad bill. So this does not end right before Christmas.
The CR Instead, the Continuing Resolution continues until the end
of January. That was significant. We also included three appropriation
bills in the deals. Now these are appropriation bills. There
are two ways you can fund the government. You can
fund the government through an appropriation bill. They're thirteen different
(05:58):
appropriation bills that fund different cabinet agencies in different major programs. Yep,
those take sixty votes. That's what's called regular order. That's
the way the system is supposed to work. And then
you could also fund the government through a continuing resolution
also called a CR that just keeps everything the way
it was before and maintains the status quo. We ended
(06:21):
up doing a combination of both. So in this deal
we have number one, the ag approach, So that's the
agriculture appropriation that includes the funds that farmers rely on,
but it also importantly includes SNAP. It includes food stamps.
So one of the consequences of the shutdown was the
funding for food stamps went away. With this appropriation bill,
(06:44):
we will fund the food stamps for an entire year,
so that will be taken off the table.
Speaker 3 (06:48):
And by the way, let's be very clear about that.
Speaker 4 (06:51):
Republicans tried to make sure that even with the government shutdown,
that SNAP benefits were continuing and were not stopped. Democrats
made damn sure that people did not get their food
stent benefits during the forty day the longest shut down
in American history. They did that because they thought it
was leveraged to hurt the poorest among us in America,
(07:13):
and that would then give them leverage to get more
of the port rail things they wanted for the Democratic
programs and initiatives. And they didn't care if you couldn't
feed your kids over the last forty days.
Speaker 1 (07:24):
So understand that was the entire Democrat strategy is maximize
the pain on the American people because the more pain
that they could inflict, they were counting on the media
to be dishonest and blame it all on Trump, and
so repeatedly this past week, I went back and forth
with Democrats repeatedly, and their talking points were very simple.
They would say, well, you have a Republican president, of
(07:44):
Republican Senate, Republican House. The shutdown is their fault, and
that was it. And they were counting on the dishonest
corporate media to tell that lie what they omitted. And
actually I talked about this just this weekend. I spoke
on the Senate Florida. I said, look, whenever anyone takes
an oath to testify in court, that they put their
(08:06):
hand on the Bible and they pledge to tell the truth,
the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Well, the
Democrats saying that they're failing part number two, the whole truth,
because it is true we have a Republican president, House
and Senate. What they're ignoring is the fact that it
requires sixty votes and it is the Democrats who force
the shutdown because they're the ones that are not voting
to keep the government open. This package, we took three
(08:27):
appropriations bills. The ag Appropriation Bill which is farmers, ranchers
and food stamps, the Military Construction and the VA Bill,
so that funds funds our veterans and also gives funds
for military construction projects across the country. And then the
Legislature Bill, which, among other things, we increase the funding
(08:48):
for security for members of Congress. Given the political violence
we see, I think that's very important to have more
funds to increase security on both.
Speaker 5 (08:57):
Sides of the aisle.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
So that package, those are three appropriation bills that were bipartisan.
The Democrats had a party in that were passed along
with the thirty day CR or not thirty day the
CR to January thirtieth.
Speaker 3 (09:12):
Right, Henry thirtieth.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
Yeah, yeah, So all of that is what we got
sixty votes for tonight. Now what does that mean tomorrow morning?
Does that mean the government is opened Monday morning? Unfortunately No.
Speaker 4 (09:25):
And by the way, people are frustrated because they think, well,
you guys shut it down quickly, then why can't you
just reopen it quickly, and this is how the sausage
is made. And that's why I think there's some miscommunication
on Sunday night about.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Oh, the government's like open up.
Speaker 4 (09:39):
I mean, there was major news out it's like government
opening up, the votes to have it, and they're thinking,
all right, well, if I'm flying out Monday or Monday
afternoon or Tuesday, there should be no problems at the airport.
That's also not true. I want to be very clear
about that.
Speaker 1 (09:53):
Look, if the Democrats want to be full obstructionist, they
could delay opening the government as late as Friday of
this week. Really, because there are a series of votes
we have to take in. Under the Senate rules, they
can delay thing. They have a right to an intervening
day between one voter and another. They can delay things
for thirty hours, and so they could drag it out.
(10:16):
Even though we have the sixty votes. They could drag
it out as late as Friday. My guess is they'll
drag it out till Monday or Tuesday. My best guess
is the government will open up Tuesday or Wednesday. But
we really are dealing with Look the Bernie Sanders Is
of the world. By the way, Chuck Schumer voted no
because the whole point of this was for him to
(10:39):
tell the crazy left he still hates Donald Trump. Now,
I don't think these eight Democrats would have voted yes
without Schumer blessing their voting yes. So this was always
going to end this one.
Speaker 4 (10:50):
I was going to ask you, so getting to the
perfect number of eight, and again, this is how the
sausage is made. So let's talk about behind the scenes.
You guys, the Repubublicans have been meeting right behind the scenes.
You have your normal lunches that you have in your
other meetings, and I see you guys on the four
of the Senate talking and you're outside of the Senate.
I mean Democrats are doing the same thing when they
(11:12):
decide who is in the eight to vote yes? Is
that strategic based on who needs cover when they're running
for office?
Speaker 5 (11:19):
Is that?
Speaker 4 (11:19):
I mean there's some like Fetterman that clearly were leaders
on this, just saying I think it's wrong to hold
the American be hostage.
Speaker 3 (11:25):
I'm voting to open this thing up.
Speaker 4 (11:27):
How do they decide on the exact eight and is
it literally to the point where they're like, all right,
we're going to only give eight and you got to
make your argument to us why you should be in
the eight and we'll give you that blessing.
Speaker 3 (11:40):
How does that work?
Speaker 5 (11:42):
So I don't know for sure.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
I will say there were a number of Republicans who
were surprised we did not get more than eight. So
there were other Democrats who were telling Republicans privately they
were going to vote yes to open the government. People
like John Ossoff, who's got he's the most vulnerable Democrat
running for reelection in Georgia. He just voted the fifteenth
time to keep the government shut down, you know, George.
(12:06):
By the way, Raphael Warnock, the other Georgia senator, did
as well. We actually thought there was a real possibility
they would both vote tonight to open the government. I
don't know what Osof's calculus was. Warnock will often vote
with Osof to give him some political coverage, so we
figured that they would go They would go either both
yes or both no. They both voted to keep the
(12:27):
government shut down.
Speaker 4 (12:29):
What is the chances to guys like that on Tuesday
Wednesday vote yes? After they say all right, well fine,
we're already going to be there. Does that change you
think that eight number could that change at tenth p
or is it pretty much a eight no.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
I could easily see on a subsequent vote. Some additional Democrats,
Patty Murray, who is the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee,
a number of Republicans believe she was going to vote yes.
I mentioned we just were going to pass three appropriation bills.
She played a major hand in drafting those reappropriation bills.
And so for appropriators. Look, when Chuck Schumer and the
(13:04):
Democrats had the majority, do you know how many appropriation
bills they passed into law?
Speaker 4 (13:09):
How many?
Speaker 5 (13:10):
Zero?
Speaker 1 (13:11):
Like the process was broken, they didn't do appropriations. It's
our hope to actually go through the process, to have amendments,
to negotiate it. And that's what these three bills are doing.
And yet the senior Democrat on the Appropriations Committee voted no.
Chris Coons, who is widely seen as one of the
more moderate Democrats. He voted to keep the government shut down.
(13:36):
Alissa Slotkin from Michigan. Look, Michigan's a purple state. She
voted to keep the government shut down. Gary Peters, also
from Michigan retiring, he voted to keep the government to
shut down. So there were there were another half dozen
or so that a lot of folks thought we would
have a chance at getting their votes, and we did not.
Speaker 4 (13:55):
So when you don't get those votes, we move forward.
You said this thing could end up to Friday. You're
guessing probably Tuesday, Wednesday the government reopens.
Speaker 3 (14:04):
How many more votes after tonight?
Speaker 4 (14:06):
Again, for people that are listening, we're doing this Sunday
night at ten fifteen right now in DC. How many
people are How many votes will it take starting now
to get the government actually reopen.
Speaker 1 (14:20):
We need to continue to hold sixty, but we're going
to the underlying terms of the deal have been cut.
So I don't expect any of the eight who just
voted yes to flip. So I think we've got our sixty.
But the remaining Democrats can just drag things out and
make it painful. I hope they don't. I actually pulled
Dick Durbin aside. Durbin is retiring, and I mentioned I
(14:43):
always thought this was going to end with retiring Democrats
voting to open the government. Durbin did so. Now, look,
he's the number two in leadership among the Democrats. He's
Chuck Schumer's right hand buddy's retiring. I told Dick tonight,
I said, look, we've got sixty now. It sure would
be nice if, like you guys didn't drag this out
unnecessarily till Friday, and just the identical outcome will happen,
(15:07):
and it just is more painful for everybody. I think
there are a lot of Democrats who feel that way.
It's why I think we'll end tuesday or Wednesday. But
who the heck knows. Now, there's another element to this
deal that's getting some attention online, which is a commitment
to reverse the rifts, the reductions and forces that happened
(15:28):
during the shutdown. Yeah, and there's some folks online saying, oh,
you guys cave, this is terrible. That was an offer
that President Trump made, I think like two weeks ago
to the Democrats that has been on the table for
them a long long time, and the White House made
the decision, Okay, if you guys open the government, we agree,
(15:48):
we'll offer you that will reverse those rifts. So that
was in the deal, But it was a deal that
came from the White House that we just agreed. Okay,
if that's if those are the terms that the President
wants to cut, we'll back up the president.
Speaker 4 (16:00):
So you go into Monday, you're going to have more
meetings throughout the day, or explain to me Monday what
that looks like.
Speaker 1 (16:07):
We're anticipating the first vote probably around noon. And as
I said that, there could be we could have done
it all tonight if the Democrats had agreed to In
the Senate, you can do anything by unanimous consent, and
so if they wanted to open the government tonight, they
could have just consented to do one vote and then
do the other one next to the other, one next,
the other one next, and we'd be done.
Speaker 5 (16:27):
Like you can do that.
Speaker 4 (16:28):
You know, literally, instead of us recording right now, you
guys could actually be voting and this could have all
been Monday morning. The government is open for business, all
the fa guys are back to normal, everybody's getting paid,
and they're like, now, screwt, We'll just wait a few
more days. So no one's flying home, right, I mean,
you're not flying home tonight, are you?
Speaker 5 (16:47):
Nope?
Speaker 1 (16:47):
Nope, I'm in DC. I didn't see my family this weekend.
I would have loved to have seen my kids. I didn't.
I spent most of the time just sitting here waiting
for Democrats to finally agree to cut a deal, but
it was striking. We could have done it tonight, but
to do that you need unanimous consent. That means you
(17:10):
don't need sixty you need one hundred. That means one
person can object and say no, drag it out.
Speaker 5 (17:17):
I want to burn more time. I want to burn
more time.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
And you have people like Bernie Sanders, you have all
the Democrats who are running for president that want to
want a spectacle, and so that if they really decide
to be just just fully obstructionist, they could drag it
as late as Friday.
Speaker 3 (17:37):
All right.
Speaker 4 (17:38):
So one other question is this is unfolding. When the
government opens back up, and let's just use a hypothetical
of Wednesday, all right, Wednesday the government opens up, does
that mean that instantly the system is going to go
back to normal. I'm saying this to people traveling. You
and I have traveled a lot. We've started to see
the breakdown of air traffic control and of having to
(18:02):
cancel flights. I've witnessed it traveling internationally and domestically over
the last couple of days.
Speaker 3 (18:07):
You've done it as well.
Speaker 4 (18:09):
And so when it opens back up, is that like
an instant fix or is that gonna take a couple
of days to cycle through the system as well? What
does travel look like Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday.
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Look at least travel Monday and Monday and Tuesday, I
would expect still really significant delays and really significant cancelations.
The reason for those delays and those cancelations. We have
roughly fifty thousand TSA agents all across the country. Many
of them are going into work. None of them are
being paid. They all missed their last paycheck, didn't get
(18:43):
their last paycheck. We have roughly fourteen thousand air traffic controllers.
Many of them are going into work. None of them
are getting paid. They all missed their last paycheck. Listen,
if you're a TSA agent, if you're an air traffic controller,
typical TSA agent or air traffic controller doesn't have a
deep reservoir of savings. I mean, they're under real stress
(19:04):
right now. How do I pay my mortgage, how do
I pay my rent? How do I pay my bills?
And so what is happening with both TSA agents and controllers.
They're calling in sick, They're just not showing up, say summer,
coming into work. The problem is in New York City
on Halloween Day, roughly eighty percent of the controllers called
in sick and didn't show up to work. That's Chuck
(19:25):
Schumer's hometown, by the way. And so we're seeing with TSA.
You had Monday a week ago, the lines in the
Houston Bush Airport were two and a half to three
hours lined long to get through security because they were
so short staffed on TSA agents they didn't have enough
to move people through security. So even if the government
(19:47):
opens up tomorrow, you're dealing with the independent decisions of
fifty thousand TSA agents and fourteen thousand controllers when they
come back to work. And the reason that the FAA
has mandated ten percent flights be canceled is they're looking
at the data and seeing that these short staffed air
traffic controllers there's an increased risk to safety. So they're saying,
(20:08):
all right, if we don't have full staffing, we got
to reduce the number of flights. So in a week,
do I expect things to go back to normal? Yes,
a week after things open up, but it could easily
take several days for people to say, Okay, I'm going
to come back into work now. That doesn't happen automatically
just by flipping a switch.
Speaker 3 (20:29):
So what you're.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
Basically telling me is this week, when I'm flying, and
when you're flying, and so many others that listen to
this show are flying, we're going to be dealing with
this type of chaos because the Democrats decided not to
do their job even while doing their job on Sunday
night right now.
Speaker 1 (20:45):
Yes, and by the way, they could have agreed to
open it all up tonight that they could have given consent,
said okay, you've got a deal, let's move ahead, and
it's now just the obstructionist who you know. If your
flight is canceled tomorrow, you could thank Chuck Schumer and
every Democrat senator running for president who's trying to show
off to the crazy left. But we will get it
(21:08):
open now, but it will take it'll take a few
more days.
Speaker 5 (21:12):
In a middle.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
Thank you for listening to the forty seven Morning Update
with Ben Ferguson. Please make sure you hit subscribe wherever
you're listening to this podcast right now and for more
in depth news, also subscribe to the Ben Ferguson podcast
and we will see you back here tomorrow,
Host
Ben Ferguson
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