WASHINGTON, D.C. — Members of Congress returned to the Capitol on Sunday to a standing ovation from themselves, hailing the bipartisan triumph of ending a 41-day shutdown they had personally caused, scheduled, extended twice, and at one point voted to commemorate with a commission.
Lawmakers from both chambers gathered on the steps for a press availability described by aides as ‘a healing moment,’ during which seventeen separate senators thanked seventeen separate God for giving them the strength to vote yes on a continuing resolution functionally identical to the one they had rejected in September, October, and the second week of October.
‘This was a hard-fought victory for the American people,’ said Sen. Brent Halliwell (R-OK), who spent the shutdown posting photos of himself eating at a steakhouse the FAA could no longer regulate. ‘We never gave up. We never stopped negotiating. We just did most of the negotiating during a 19-day recess in our home districts.’
The reopened federal government immediately began the process of paying back wages to 800,000 employees who had spent six weeks discovering which of their bills could be ignored and which could not. TSA agents at Reagan National described returning to work as ‘mostly the same, but now with a thank-you card from a congressman who voted to fire us in March.’
A staff aide on the Senate Appropriations Committee, who asked not to be named because she would like to retain her job through Christmas, described the reopening package as ‘a 14-page document where eleven of the pages are the cover sheet.’ The bill funds the government through January 30, at which point the same lawmakers will once again be shocked to discover a deadline exists.
House leadership has already begun circulating a draft resolution honoring ‘the courage of those who voted to end the impasse,’ a list that includes every member who voted to begin it. The resolution is expected to pass unanimously and be entered into the Congressional Record directly above the unpaid invoice from the cleaning crew that worked through the shutdown without pay.
Speaker Mike Johnson, asked whether Congress bore any responsibility for the 41 days of canceled cancer trials, grounded weather forecasts, and shuttered food assistance offices, paused thoughtfully before answering that the real story was ‘the resilience of the American spirit,’ a phrase he then repeated four more times while walking briskly toward an elevator.
Federal workers returning Monday will find their desks exactly as they left them, save for an automated email from HR titled ‘Welcome Back!’ with an attached PDF explaining that their health insurance lapsed on day 32 and the appeals window closed on day 38. A separate email from leadership thanks them for their patriotism and reminds them that the next shutdown is tentatively scheduled for the last week of January.
At a Sunday evening reception in the Russell Building, Sen. Halliwell raised a glass of what aides confirmed was government-procured champagne and offered a toast to ‘the institution that always finds a way.’ He was referring, observers noted, to the same institution that had spent six weeks unable to find the light switch, the door, or its own ass with both hands and a flashlight.