Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-New Hampshire, speaks during a Senate Armed Services committee hearing on the nomination of Pete Hegseth to be secretary of defense on Jan. 14, 2025.

WASHINGTON – If there's a way out of the government shutdown, it has everything to do with Democrats in the United States Senate.

The more moderate ones – and those eyeing retirement – are widely seen as the linchpins who can supply the votes to get out of the current mess. President Donald Trump and Republicans already have two Senate Democrats on their side, plus Maine Independent Sen. Angus King, who caucuses with the Democrats. But to pass a funding bill that reopens government, the GOP still needs five more lawmakers to break ranks.

While Democrats have mostly held together so far, there's no guarantee they won't change their minds. It's been just over a week since federal funding lapsed, prompting the Trump administration to furlough hundreds of thousands of civil workers and pausing or curtailing programs that people across the country rely on. If past is prologue, the longer a shutdown drags on, the more pain Americans will start to feel.

On Oct. 15, for instance, military service members will miss their first paycheck. It's a deadline that senators like Gary Peters, a retiring Democrat from Michigan, say they are watching closely.

"I always worry when people are going to lose paychecks," he said on his way to the Senate floor Wednesday.

Still, Peters and most other Democrats voted for the sixth time on Oct. 8 against Republicans' proposed seven-week funding extension. Without a compromise to address lapsing health insurance subsidies, Democrats refused to change their votes. The subsidies, which are connected to the Affordable Care Act and come in the form of tax credits, are set to expire at the end of the year, raising premiums for millions.

Armed with new polling showing some Americans may already be blaming Republicans for the shutdown, most Democrats are standing firm against pressure from GOP lawmakers.

"There are chinks in their armor right now," Sen. Tammy Baldwin, D-Wisconsin, told USA TODAY.

A few Democrats to watch

In March, the last time lawmakers flirted with a government shutdown, a group of eight mostly moderate Democrats joined with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer to keep the government funded. They faced immediate complaints from their left flank.

That group of lawmakers from earlier this year included Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada and John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. While Schumer has reversed course, now leading Democrats in opposing the GOP's plan to reopen the government, both Masto and Fetterman have broken ranks with him and the rest of their party to keep the lights on.

Several others in the original March group – including Sens. Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Gary Peters of Michigan and Dick Durbin of Illinois – have instead decided to toe the party line this time around. Yet all three are on their way to retirement, largely insulating them from political consequences if they decide to change their votes.

Shaheen in particular has been a key part of behind-the-scenes bipartisan negotiations to strike a deal on health care policy. Asked whether those talks could soon result in a shutdown off-ramp, she was tight-lipped.

"We'll see," she told USA TODAY.

Another lawmaker to watch is Shaheen's New Hampshire counterpart in the Senate, Maggie Hassan, who voted to fund the government back in March. So is Sen. Tina Smith, a Democrat from Minnesota who's retiring. So far, both have voted against Republicans' short-term funding bill.

Bipartisan talks 'stalled'

The mood on Capitol Hill shifted slightly this week after Trump said in the Oval Office he was potentially open to striking a health care deal with Democrats.

"The president indicated that he’s half seriously thinking about it," Sen. Jack Reed, D-Rhode Island, told USA TODAY. "He usually talks to X and to the world before he talks to anybody else."

Yet almost as soon as it appeared, the light at the end of the shutdown tunnel dimmed. In a follow-up social media post, the president said Democrats would need to vote to reopen the government first before he would negotiate. Republicans largely echoed that sentiment.

The back-and-forth didn't seem to help backchannel talks among senators.

“Things are still stalled," said Sen. Markwayne Mullin, R-Oklahoma.

Zachary Schermele is a congressional reporter for USA TODAY. You can reach him by email at zschermele@usatoday.com. Follow him on X at @ZachSchermele and Bluesky at @zachschermele.bsky.social.

This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: A handful of Senate Democrats could end the shutdown. Is anyone budging?

Reporting by Zachary Schermele, USA TODAY / USA TODAY

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