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March 14, 2025 11:53 AM UTC

Bennet, Hick Hard "NO" On Republican Spending Resolution

  • 11 Comments
  • by: Colorado Pols

UPDATE: Reports today that Colorado’s Sen. Michael Bennet, who will vote against the continuing resolution, blew his stack this week in a private meeting in frustration over Democratic leadership’s lack of resolve to oppose the bill:


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Colorado Senators Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper (D).

ABC News reports on the latest developments in the debate over a continuing resolution to keep the federal government’s doors open past an impending shutdown deadline this weekend: after initially signaling that Senate Democrats would hold together to resist the temporary spending plan, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer waved a white flag yesterday.

Minority Leader Chuck Schumer took to the Senate floor Friday morning to defend his decision to support a Republican short-term funding bill that will effectively help avoid a government shutdown at the end of the day.

His surprise reversal, first announced Thursday evening — a day after he said he and Democrats would try to block the bill — means there will almost certainly be enough Democratic votes to advance the measure to a final Senate vote Friday just hours before the shutdown deadline.

“As everyone knows, government funding expires at midnight tonight. As I announced yesterday, I will vote to keep the government open. I believe it is the best way to minimize the harm that the Trump administration will do to the American people,” Schumer said Friday.

Although Schumer’s capitulation increases the chances that the resolution will pass the Senate, several more Democrats will need to join him in voting for cloture on the CR in order for it to pass. And as AP reported yesterday afternoon, neither of Colorado’s Democratic Senators plan to do so:

U.S. Sen. John Hickenlooper, a Colorado Democrat, said Wednesday during a virtual town hall he would vote against the Republican bill and vote “no” on the Senate cloture motion that needs 60 votes to get around the filibuster…

Colorado’s other senator, Democrat Michael Bennet, said Thursday he will also vote no on the bill and the cloture motion.

“Republicans knew they needed Democratic votes to pass their spending bill,” Bennet said in a written statement. “But they refused to work with Democrats on a bipartisan deal to put American families first.” [Pols emphasis]

This morning, Sen. John Hickenlooper reiterated his opposition in the wake of Schumer’s cave-in:

Democrats are undeniably faced with a difficult choice: to vote for a short-ish (but arguably not short enough) spending resolution that makes deep cuts to domestic spending while boosting military expenditures and was crafted without any input from Democrats, or let the government shut down with all of the attendant real-world consequences we’ve witnessed in previous impasses–made potentially worse this time by the likelihood that the Musk Trump administration would exploit a shutdown to further their agenda of hacking the federal government into bathtub-drownable bits.

Whatever the outcome, let the record show that Colorado’s U.S. Senators were ready to fight it out. Given the intense blowback Schumer is experiencing from grassroots Democrats who are spoiling for a fight, Bennet and Hickenlooper are in the right place politically.

But nothing about this situation is desirable for the national interest.

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11 thoughts on “Bennet, Hick Hard “NO” On Republican Spending Resolution”

  1. I'm glad to hear our Senators are going to vote No on this dumbassery. I just hope they can convince enough fellow Democrats to also vote No.

    The only way out of this bad government is by going through with it. Democrats need to let Republicans touch the stove because Republicans really, REALLY want to touch the stove.

    As to the point about "a short-ish (but arguably not short enough) spending resolution", isn't this CR for an entire year? Aren't budgets supposed to be for an entire year? So isn't this emergency, last-minute, Republican-only stopgap their best proposal at a budget?!

    2. The Continuing Resolution is to the end of the fiscal year, September 30, 2025. 

      The earlier Reconciliation Resolution provides instructions for ten years of future budgets (until there are other instructions).  But that Reconciliation Resolution is not an actual appropriation — only instructions on what the committees should do when as they develop appropriations. 

      Given the inability to pass budgets in recent sessions of Congress and no sign of improved process to encourage compromise or improved cohesion in the Conferences to insure passage, we should be looking forward to a long, LONG set of battles over Continuing Resolutions. The threat of shutdowns will continue until morale improves.

  2. The Senate Rs will need an extra Democrat to pass the CR. Apparently Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has already said he won't vote for it.

  3. A hearty "Go fuck yourself with a rusty hacksaw blade" to Chuck Schumer, Catherine Cortez Masto, Dick Durbin, John Fetterman, Kirsten Gillibrand, Maggie Hassan, Gary Peters, Brian Schatz, Jeanne Shaheen, and Angus King.

    1. My question … what are the Democrats willing to do together to have an opposition position. 

      Next "pressure point" / must pass resolution will be on the debt ceiling, coming sometime this summer when "extraordinary measures" of the Treasury are no longer enough to keep lights on. 

      Semafor has a good article on the current understanding of the coming debt ceiling fight:

      Senate Republicans give House’s debt ceiling plan cold shoulder

      As Republicans try to wrap up a messy campaign to simply fund the government past Friday, they are now preparing to confront an even more consequential deadline. And it all comes as stock markets are down, economic uncertainty is up and everyone is watching President Donald Trump’s tariff regime. Most lawmakers think the debt ceiling will need to be raised sometime around May or June.

      Markets pay even closer attention to the debt ceiling than government funding deadlines; getting too close to a breach can harm the country’s credit rating. Trump sought to avoid this whole fight last December when he asked for Congress to end the debt ceiling altogether before he became president, a request that came too late.

  5. It seems  to me (IMO) there is nothing more important for Democrats to do, ( Very Soon )!, than find, select, and rally behind a leader. Democrats need a leader.

    That is all the MAGAts have.

  6. Good for our Senators for standing on principle…but who really believes Bennet "blew his stack"? What exactly does a Senator Bennet blowing his stack look like? Not sure we have the same definition.

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