A Senate vote to move forward on fiscal year 2026 defense appropriations legislation failed last Thursday, as most Democrats opposed supporting the measure amid the ongoing government shutdown.
“We want to appropriate beyond just defense. We want a broader package [of spending bills] and to have clarity from our president, the House and the Senate about how we address the imminent health security crisis that confronts millions of Americans and, for today and tomorrow, keeps our government shut down,” Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), the top Democrat on the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee (SAC-D), said on the floor ahead of voting against the cloture vote.
The Senate voted 50-44 on the procedural step, failing to gain the 60 votes to move forward, with Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (Nev.), John Fetterman (Pa.) and Jeanne Shaheen (N.H.) as the only Democrats to support the measure.
“I believe it is critical that the Senate and Congress return to a bipartisan appropriations approach and try to begin rebuilding trust. This vote would allow us to consider Senate appropriations bills which were passed out of committee with overwhelming bipartisan support,” Shaheen, a member of both SAC-D and the Armed Services Committee, said in a statement. “The bipartisan Senate appropriations defense bill will protect our national security and would ensure our men and women in uniform receive pay and benefits. We can, and should, try to move forward on a bipartisan appropriations process even as we work to prevent tens of millions of Americans from seeing a massive spike in their health insurance premiums in the coming days.”
Congress remains locked in a stalemate over stopgap funding legislation to reopen the government, with Democrats opposing the decision to not include an extension of health care premium subsidies under the Affordable Care Act.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) brought up the House-passed version of defense appropriations legislation on Wednesday, but the upper chamber would have substituted that for its own version had the cloture vote been approved.
The Senate Appropriations Committee in late July approved its $852.5 billion fiscal year 2026 defense spending bill, adopting a $21.7 billion topline increase that boosts funds for shipbuilding, while the House’s legislation it passed in July adheres to the administration’s requested spending level.
“Today, our colleagues’ refusal even to begin considering the overwhelmingly bipartisan defense appropriations bill is a sobering reminder that there is, however, much to lose,” Sen. Mitch McConnell, chair of SAC-D, said in a statement. “Last week, the Senate passed a National Defense Authorization Act that raised the defense topline by more than $30 billion to meet these growing threats. However, without appropriated dollars, such an authorization only grows the gap between our rhetoric and our action.”