The Democrats are reeling. They’re having a hard time overcoming their many struggles.
And the Democrat Party was rocked by a brutal reality check they may never recover from.
Americans are waking up to the reality of who really came out on top in the recent government shutdown fiasco, and it’s not looking good for the Democrats. A fresh poll from the Economist/YouGov reveals that a mere eight percent of the public thinks the Democrats emerged victorious from the chaos.
The numbers paint a stark picture of public sentiment. When asked straight up who won the shutdown battle, the biggest chunk—39 percent—declared that “neither” party claimed victory.
Right behind that, 35 percent pointed to the Republicans as the winners, leaving Democrats scraping the bottom with just eight percent.
This sentiment cuts across party lines in a telling way. Even within their own ranks, Democrats aren’t buying the idea of a win. Only 14 percent of them believe their side triumphed, while a surprising 25 percent credit the Republicans, and a whopping 45 percent say nobody won.
Republicans, on the other hand, feel more confident about their position. A solid 52 percent of GOP respondents assert that their party prevailed, though 26 percent still admit that neither side walked away with a clear advantage.
Independents, often the swing voters who decide elections, lean heavily toward skepticism. Forty-six percent of them see no winner at all, with 28 percent giving the nod to Republicans and a paltry four percent siding with Democrats.
This poll didn’t happen in a vacuum—it was conducted November 15-17, 2025, right after the dust settled, surveying 1,549 U.S. citizens with a margin of error of plus or minus 3.5 percent.
The shutdown itself dragged on for an unprecedented 43 days, marking it as the longest in American history. It finally ground to a stop recently when President Donald Trump signed a clean continuing resolution into law.
That resolution keeps the government running through the end of January and covers funding for key areas like agriculture, military construction and Veterans Affairs, plus the legislative branch—all extended through September’s end, according to Breitbart News reports.
According to the outlet, at the signing ceremony, Trump stood tall alongside House Speaker Mike Johnson from Louisiana, Majority Leader Steve Scalise also from Louisiana, Majority Whip Tom Emmer from Minnesota, and several cabinet members. He didn’t hold back in calling out the Democrats for their role in the mess.
Trump hammered home how the Democrats stonewalled efforts to reopen the government, turning down Republican offers for a straightforward extension. Instead, they pushed for a massive $1.5 trillion in spending loaded with partisan goodies.
Among those demands? Half a billion dollars funneled to the left-wing media and healthcare perks for illegal immigrants—priorities that put American citizens last.
The president pulled no punches in his remarks, exposing what he saw as the Democrats’ true motives:
“For the past 43 days, Democrats in Congress shut down the government of the United States in an attempt to extort American taxpayers for hundreds of billions of dollars for illegal aliens and people that came into our country illegally,” Trump stated.
He drove the point further, declaring victory against what he described as a blatant power grab. “Today, we’re sending a clear message that we will never give in to extortion, because that’s what it was. They tried to extort — the Democrats tried to extort our country,” he said.
Trump highlighted the real-world pain inflicted on everyday folks during the ordeal:
“They caused 20,000 flights to be cancelled or delayed; they departed so many times so late. People were hurt so badly. Nobody’s ever seen anything like this one. This was a no-brainer, this was an easy extension, but they didn’t want to do it the easy way.”
In the end, this episode exposes the Democrats’ willingness to play games with the nation’s stability just to cater to their radical base, while Republicans stood firm for the American people.
