Senate will vote Thursday on dueling proposals to reopen the government

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• Senate leaders on Tuesday agreed to hold votes this week on dueling proposals to reopen shuttered federal agencies, forcing a political reckoning for senators grappling with the longest shutdown in US history: Side with President Donald Trump or vote to temporarily end the shutdown and keep negotiating.
• Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. set up the two showdown votes for Thursday, a day before some 800,000 federal workers are due to miss a second paycheck.
• Both measures are expected fall short of the 60 votes need to pass, leaving little hope they represent the clear path out of the mess.
• But the plan represents the first test of Senate Republicans' resolve behind Trump's insistence that agencies remain closed until Congress approves $5.7 billion to build a wall on the US-Mexico border.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate leaders on Tuesday agreed to hold votes this week on dueling proposals to reopen shuttered federal agencies, forcing a political reckoning for senators grappling with the longest shutdown in US history: Side with President Donald Trump or vote to temporarily end the shutdown and keep negotiating.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky. set up the two showdown votes for Thursday, a day before some 800,000 federal workers are due to miss a second paycheck. One vote will be on his own measure, which reflects Trump's offer to trade border wall funding for temporary protections for some immigrants. It was quickly rejected by Democrats. The second vote is set for a bill approved by the Democratic-controlled House reopening government through Feb. 8, with no wall money, to give bargainers time to talk.

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NOW WATCH: America is more politically divided than ever, and the government shutdown only makes that more apparent

See Also:

• During the shutdown, government lawyers in South Texas say they're only allowed to work on cases to seize land for Trump's border wall
• The number of federal workers seeking unemployment benefits doubled in the first 2 weeks of the shutdown, and it's expected to keep rising
• The government shutdown could cause an unprecedented mess for the Super Bowl in Atlanta

SEE ALSO: The government shutdown may force Trump to make a nightmare choice between his border wall and the economy

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