Senate Democrats make their move in the shutdown fight: From the Politics Desk

Welcome to the online version of From the Politics Desk, an evening newsletter that brings you the NBC News Politics team’s latest reporting and analysis from the White House, Capitol Hill and the campaign trail.

In today’s edition, we explore the next steps in the shutdown battle after Senate Democrats said they would block the GOP’s government funding bill. Plus, Andrea Mitchell examines how the U.S. might convince Russia to agree to a ceasefire with Ukraine. 

Sign up to receive this newsletter in your inbox every weekday here.

— Adam Wollner

Senate Democrats make their move in the shutdown fight

As we wrote yesterday, the House’s passage of a Republican stopgap funding bill has put Senate Democrats in a bind: Either back a measure they disapprove of and give up some of the only leverage they will have on major legislation this year, or reject it and allow a government shutdown to occur. 

That bind was on full display today as they debated their next moves with the government set to run out of money in just over 48 hours.  

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer finally staked out his position, saying Democrats wouldn’t provide the votes to pass the GOP’s six-month continuing resolution. The measure requires 60 votes to advance in the Senate, and Republicans only control 53 seats.

“Funding the government should be a bipartisan effort but Republicans chose a partisan path, drafting their continuing resolution without any input — any input — from congressional Democrats. Because of that, Republicans do not have the votes in the Senate to invoke cloture on the House CR,” Schumer said.

Instead, he called for a one-month funding bill to provide more time to both sides to negotiate a deal.

“Our caucus is unified on a clean April 11 CR that will keep the government open and give Congress time to negotiate bipartisan legislation that can pass,” he said. “I hope our Republican colleagues will join us to avoid a shutdown on Friday.”

Schumer’s remarks on the Senate floor came after a lunch meeting among Democratic senators. Outside the room, reporters could hear senators loudly making their point to their colleagues.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said they want to have the ability to propose changes to the bill. 

“There are not the votes right now to pass it,” Kaine said. “Democrats had nothing to do with this bill. And we want an opportunity to get an amendment vote or two. And so that’s what we are insisting on.” 

Still, some Democrats fear that a shutdown would be worse than accepting the bill. 

“Quite frankly, both outcomes are bad,” Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., said. “Elections have consequences, but this is an extreme bill. If it passes, it will hurt a lot of ordinary people on the ground. If the government shuts down, that will hurt a lot of ordinary people on the ground, and so that is the dilemma in which we found ourselves.”

“I’m weighing the badness of each option,” added Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz. 

Meanwhile, House Democratic leaders urged their Senate counterparts to vote down the GOP funding bill as they kicked off a three-day policy retreat. 

Read more from Sahil Kapur, Ryan Nobles, Julie Tsirkin and Frank Thorp V →

What to know from the Trump presidency today

• Trump said that he feels “very badly” for the thousands of civil servants who have lost their jobs in recent weeks but that “many of them don’t work at all.”
• Canada announced new retaliatory trade duties on some $21 billion worth of U.S. goods, a response to Trump implementing universal steel and aluminum tariffs. The European Union is targeting a range of U.S. goods worth $28 billion, including beef, motorcycles and whiskey alongside American-made steel and aluminum. And China signaled it was readying a response.
• Price growth cooled more than expected in February, a welcome sign for markets that have been spooked by the specter of persistent inflation, though evolving U.S. trade policies complicate the outlook.
• The Department of Homeland Security is ramping up its efforts to convince immigrants who don’t have legal status to self-deport. DHS also said its immigrant detention centers are at capacity.
• The Trump administration is gutting the Justice Department’s unit that oversees prosecutions of public officials accused of corruption.

Follow live updates →

What comes next in the Russia-Ukraine ceasefire talks

By Andrea Mitchell

President Donald Trump said “it is up to Russia now” to agree to the monthlong ceasefire proposed by the U.S. and accepted by Ukraine.

National security adviser Mike Waltz has now spoken to his Russian counterpart. White House envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to be flying from Qatar to Moscow to close the deal. There’s talk of a Trump call to Russian President Vladimir Putin in the offing. During the past week, the administration pummeled Ukrainian President Zelenskyy into submission by withholding weapons and intelligence from Ukraine.  

What leverage does the U.S. have with Putin? Trump said today he could “do things financially that would be very bad for Russia.” He has mentioned the possibility of sanctions, but with China, North Korea and Iran helping keep Russia afloat, existing sanctions on Russia have been largely ineffective. 

And in almost all of Trump’s statements and actions since returning to the White House, he is again demonstrating an affinity for the Russian president. When Russia was, by Trump’s own admission, “bombing the hell out of Ukraine” after the U.S. halted military aid, Trump said he still thought Putin wanted peace, saying “he’s doing what anybody else would do.”   

Despite U.S. assessments that Russian-based hackers are responsible for Salt Typhoon, a massive hacking of U.S. targets, the administration is firing top counterintelligence experts at the CIA and FBI, and welcoming back Russian diplomatic missions previously expelled from the U.S. for espionage activities. The U.S. also sided with Russia, China and Belarus at the United Nations against a resolution supporting Ukraine. And all of this comes amid Trump’s continual searing criticism of NATO and the European Union, stunning America’s traditional Western allies and closest “Five Eyes” intelligence partners.  

With Secretary of State Marco Rubio saying “the ball is in Russia’s court,” it is likely in Russia’s interest to accept the ceasefire and instead try to defeat Zelenskyy at the negotiating table. Clearly, tortuous negotiations lie ahead over territory, security guarantees, reparations, NATO membership and more in a war that has been a “meat grinder,” to use Walz’s term.  

So despite White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt saying, “We are at the 10th-yard line and the president is expecting the Russians to help us run this into the end zone,” it would be wise to avoid declaring “mission accomplished.” 

The Trump effect goes overseas

A party that has sharply criticized President Donald Trump’s threat to take over Greenland secured a surprise election victory Tuesday in the Danish territory, but it may have to govern with a partner with a far warmer view of the U.S. president, Astha Rajvanshi reports.

The center-right, pro-business Demokraatit party, which favors a gradual move toward independence from Denmark, won 30% of the total vote share, not enough to single-handedly rule the Arctic territory. The party will instead need to partner with opponents to form a coalition.

Foremost among those other parties is the second-placed opposition party Naleraq, which won a quarter of the vote share, favors rapid independence and has reserved warm words for the Trump administration. 

The victory of two parties who favor independence — seceding from Denmark is broadly popular in Greenland — may be taken as a positive in Washington, where interest in the world’s largest island has sharply jumped since Trump began his second term.

Read more →

That’s all From the Politics Desk for now. Today’s newsletter was compiled by Adam Wollner and Bridget Bowman.

If you have feedback — likes or dislikes — email us at politicsnewsletter@nbcuni.com

And if you’re a fan, please share with everyone and anyone. They can sign up here.