In a pair of votes Thursday night, the U.S. Senate failed for the eighth time to end the government shutdown, which reached 10 days on Friday. Republicans have backed a clean continuing resolution (CR), while Democrats demand a major increase in health care spending, but neither side seems close to budging from their position. On Friday, the Trump administration also advanced a hitherto unused gambit that it hopes can break through the sea ice.

As he has done every work day of the shutdown, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) scheduled votes Thursday night on two proposals to end the shutdown. The Democratic proposal, a continuing resolution through October 31 with $1.5 trillion in health care and other spending, failed (47-50) to gain any Republican votes. The Republican proposal, a “clean” CR through November 21, failed (54-45) to break the filibuster.

These votes occurred mostly on party lines. Senator John Fetterman (D-Pa.) joined Republicans in voting for the measure, while Senators Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Angus King (I-Maine) did not. Masto and King, who caucus with Democrats, voted with Republicans on five previous votes. Otherwise, the Senate has seen no aisle-crossing nor — more to the point — no movement towards a resolution.

On Friday, the White House attempted to introduce this movement towards resolution by laying off federal workers. “The RIFs [Reductions in Force] have begun,” tweeted the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) Director Russ Vought tweeted.

The Office of Personnel Management (OPM) has broad discretion over the federal workforce during a government shutdown. It has traditionally used this discretion to determine which federal workers would be furloughed, and which would have to remain at their posts without pay. This is the first time a presidential administration has attempted to lay off staff during a government shutdown.

According to initial media reports, these layoffs affected at least the Departments of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Treasury. “All HHS employees receiving reduction-in-force notices were designated non-essential by their respective divisions,” announced HHS spokesman Andrew Nixon. “HHS continues to close wasteful and duplicative entities, including those that are at odds with the Trump administration’s Make America Healthy Again agenda.”

The White House will not proceed with layoffs uncontested, however. Two unions, the American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) and the AFL-CIO have both promised lawsuits to block the action.

At least before the layoff announcement, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) thought — or said he thought — all the cards were coming up aces for his Democratic conference. “Every day gets better for us,” Schumer beamed to Punchbowl reporters in a Wednesday interview. “Every time they try something, it doesn’t quite work. Even the threat of shutting things — ‘We’re gonna close this, we’re gonna close that.’ It’s [reflecting] at least as negative on them as it is on us. I think more so on them.”

On the surface, Schumer is putting on a bold face, claiming that Democrats have the better hand, so why would they fold?

Recall for a moment that the only reason this shutdown happened is that, the last time Schumer voted to keep the government open, he took withering fire from his far-left base in New York, where he is vulnerable to a primary challenge from a rising progressive darling like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-N.Y.). So, this time, Schumer chose to lead his party into almost certain defeat simply to “fight Trump.” The reality is that this political dynamic — the real cause of the shutdown — remains unchanged, so why would Schumer change course now?

Some rogue Republicans have begun to echo the Democrats’ talking points. “I’m actually putting the blame on the Speaker and Leader Thune in the Senate,” insisted Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).

One possible explanation for Greene’s position has nothing to do with the shutdown per se. Greene is driving a discharge petition, mostly supported by Democrats, that would force the administration to turn over information on Jeffrey Epstein. The shutdown has delayed the House swearing in newly elected Rep. Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz.), who would likely provide the last signature needed to force a floor vote on that petition.

Greene tried to justify her assigning blame to Republican leadership, “We control the House. We control the Senate. We have the White House.” In reality, however, these facts undercut her position; Republicans are united in their desire to fund the government, and the only thing preventing them from doing so is Senate Democrats, who have withheld the votes necessary to clear the Senate’s 60-vote threshold.

Schumer claims to have the better hand, but that is, by definition, a bluff coming from the leader of the minority party. “If Democrats would only agree, we could reopen the government in just a few hours,” protested Senate Majority Leader John Thune.

Republicans, for their part, have underscored Schumer’s words as a fair characterization of his position. “This notion that somehow, in this political game, the Democrats believe, according to their leader, that ‘every day gets better for us’ — that is not the experience of the American people,” declared Thune.

“Workers are missing paychecks; travelers are missing flights; businesses are struggling; military families are forced to rely on food pantries; but to Chuck Schumer that means ‘every day gets better,’” added White House Deputy Press Secretary Abigail Jackson. “No matter what Chuck Schumer thinks, Americans struggling is not good and the Democrats must stop inflicting this pain on them and reopen the government now.”

Behind the scenes, “the president is working on ways that he may have as well to ensure that troops are paid,” revealed House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). “The Republican Party stands for paying the troops. The Democrats are the ones that are demonstrating over and over and over — now eight times — that you don’t want troops to be paid.”

Paychecks for federal employees are not the only significant issue languishing in limbo during this shutdown. With each passing day, Congress also loses valuable time it could be using to fund the government through regular order — which was the whole point of a short-term CR in the first place. The Democratic minority in the Senate shows no sign yet of surrender, but we shall soon see what leverage the White House is able to exert through federal layoffs.