Democrats are seething after news emerged on Sunday that eight members of their Senate caucus had collaborated with Republicans on crafting a compromise to end the longest government shutdown in US history, without winning any healthcare concessions that they had sought.
But one name is coming in for more opprobrium than any other: Chuck Schumer, the Senate minority leader who had led the Democrats’ weeks-long stand against reopening the government without an extension of tax credits that lower premiums for Affordable Care Act (ACA) health plans.
If the results of the crucial Sunday vote are any indication, the outcome Democrats fought so hard against is now set to happen, potentially in the next few days. And though Schumer does not publicly support the compromise, lawmakers and Democrat-affiliated groups have turned on him, criticizing his leadership and calling for his ouster.
“Last night, eight ‘moderate’ Democrats got played. Conned. Rooked. Pantsed. Pumped and dumped. Rode hard and put away wet,” Rick Wilson, the ex-Republican strategist and co-founder of the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, wrote in a piece titled “Schumer and the Hateful Eight Betray America”.