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A day after president Donald Trump called him a "Palestinian, that is no longer Jewish", Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer blinked and announced that he will back Trump and will vote to keep the government open, thus avoiding a shutdown.
Following a procedural vote to pass the bill, Senators voted 54-46 to pass the House backed bill on Friday, which only needed 51 votes to be approved. Almost all Republicans backed the measure, with the exception of Kentucky Senator Rand Paul.
Speaking from the Senate floor, Sen. Schumer said, "I believe it is my job to make the best choice for the country to minimize the harms to the American people. Therefore, I will vote to keep the government open and not shut it down."
Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa., a staunch government shutdown opponent, said he would vote for the stopgap bill after several Democratic senators came out against it.
Sen. Schumer, who added that a shutdown would be "a gift for Donald Trump," also called for a one-month spending bill to keep the government open until April 11 so that Democrats can better negotiate a deal. Schumer initially claimed that his caucus was unified and wanted an alternative CR that would last only a month.
The Republican backed CR, which made it through the House on Tuesday on a nearly party-line vote of 217-213, would keep the government open for the next six months.