Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., panned Senate Democrats for their resistance to a government funding extension. (Maxine Wallace/The Washington Post via Getty Images)
"It's getting to the point now where their base [has] got so much influence in the party, and they're so demanding on just resisting and fighting everything, with respect to the Trump administration, that they can't see straight," Thune said.
"It is borderline pathological. It's like a disease," he continued. "They just — that this is something with which they're afflicted, and I think it really blurs their vision. And I think they run the risk with this, again, of putting themselves in a position of where they are viewed as the party that's trying to block the government from being funded."
House Republicans unveiled their stopgap bill, known as a continuing resolution (CR), earlier this week that would keep the government open under current spending levels until Nov. 21.
The bill is "clean," meaning there aren’t partisan policy or spending riders, save for the millions meant for beefing up security measures for lawmakers, the judicial branch and the administration, and funding meant for Washington, D.C.’s budget.
While the Republican-controlled House is expected to pass the bill on Friday, the Senate is a different story. Despite Thune commanding a majority in the upper chamber, he will need Senate Democrats to support the bill. And so far, they aren’t budging.
TRUMP PRESSURES REPUBLICANS TO PASS A CONTINUING RESOLUTION TO AVERT A GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN
President Donald Trump walks to Air Force One at Morristown Airport on Sept. 14, 2025, in Morristown, New Jersey. (Kevin Dietsch/Getty Images)
Thune said that some of the issues that Democrats were pushing in a short-term extension "don’t fit there," but that conversations, particularly on finding a deal for the healthcare insurance tax credits, could be had later on.
Still, he viewed Democrats' resistance as not "serious," given that the end goal of the short-term extension is to actually pass the dozen spending bills to fund the government — a feat that hasn’t been pulled off in Congress since the 1990s.
The House and Senate are currently working on a path forward for three spending bills, which both chambers have already passed. Thune hoped that if lawmakers were able to avert a partial shutdown, that work could continue with the remaining nine funding bills.
"This will test the seriousness of whether or not they actually want a real appropriations process, and whether they want to have a bipartisan way of funding the government," Thune said.
"And if the Democrats would give us consent to get on them and work with us, we could have a bipartisan process on the floor like we did with those other three, and we could fund most of the government the old-fashioned way, which is the way it's supposed to be done," he continued.
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But before any of that can happen, the bill has to make its way to the upper chamber. Thune is leaving the door open for the Senate to work into the weekend, but the Sept. 30 deadline is fast-approaching.
Congress also has a recess scheduled for next week to observe the Jewish New Year, and a vast majority of Republicans will be in Arizona for conservative activist Charlie Kirk’s memorial service.
There are also several procedural hurdles in the Senate that will have to be dealt with, further bogging down the process. Ultimately, Thune believed that it would be "up to the Democrats."
"If they want to put a vote up sooner, later, and our members again — if the Democrats are going to fight us and make us do this the hard way — may just decide, let's just set this up for votes," Thune said. "When we get back here, and we get up against the deadline, when it becomes real, then we use live ammo."
Fox News Digital reached out to Schumer's office for comment, but did not immediately hear back.
Alex Miller is a writer for Fox News Digital covering the U.S. Senate.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/thune-pans-democrats-shutdown-stance-borderline-pathological-like-disease