US Senate fails to pass bill to pay federal essential workers and troops through shutdown | US federal government shutdown 2025

The Senate failed Thursday to pass legislation that would keep federal workers deemed essential and soldiers paid during the government shutdown, which has stretched into its 23rd day and has no end in sight.

The upper chamber voted on Republican senator Ron Johnson’s “shutdown equity bill” that would guarantee pay for certain federal employees even when government funding runs out.

“While Democrats continue Schumer’s shutdown, they should at least agree to pay all federal employees who have to continue working,” Johnson said when he introduced the bill last week.

But Democrats opposed the legislation, arguing that it would give Donald Trump more power by allowing the president to choose which employees get paid.

“The bill, the Republican bill, is a gimmick. It’s just another tool for Trump to hurt federal workers and American families and continue this shutdown for as long as he wants,” Schumer, the Democratic Senate minority leader, said.

The bill did not receive the 60 votes needed to advance; Only three Democratic senators (John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Georgia senators Raphael Warnock and Jon Ossoff) broke with their party to support him.

Congress has been paralyzed since the beginning of the month after Democrats and Republicans failed to reach an agreement to extend government funding through the end of September. The ensuing shutdown led to an estimated 700,000 federal workers being furloughed, while hundreds of thousands more are working without pay.

Last week, Donald Trump authorized the Department of Defense to pay US military personnel using funds for research and development. Budget experts told the Guardian that the move was probably illegal.

Mike Johnson, the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, has kept his chamber out of session since Sept. 19 in an attempt to pass a Republican-backed government funding bill that would clear the House along near party lines.

Democrats rejected the measure to extend funding through Nov. 21 and instead demanded that Republicans extend subsidies for Affordable Care Act health plans that expire at the end of the year. They also want restrictions on Trump’s repeals to cut funding approved by Congress and a rollback of cuts to the Medicaid program for poor and disabled Americans.

Senate Republican leader John Thune has said he’s willing to negotiate on Affordable Care Act subsidies, but that will only happen when the government reopens. 12 voted on the Republican spending bill, which has yet to receive enough Democratic support to advance.

Democratic senators on Thursday introduced two counterproposals to pay federal workers. The “military and federal employee protection bill,” proposed by Gary Peters of Michigan, would provide a one-time payment to federal workers from the beginning of October until the bill becomes law.

The “real shutdown fairness bill,” proposed by Maryland’s Chris Van Hollen, would pay all federal employees during the shutdown, whether they are furloughed or required to continue working.

Neither received a vote in the Senate.

Fetterman, whose situation turned sour for Trump last November, released a video after the Senate vote in which he called on his fellow Democrats to change their approach.

“Reopen this government and have a serious conversation about expanding these tax credits,” he said, standing next to Republican Dave McCormick, Pennsylvania’s second senator.