Government judgment: strategists weigh its effects on the 2026 elections

The closure of the government of 2025 is about to enter its second week, Democrats and Republicans still cannot agree on a federal financing agreement.

This is the first closure of the government since 2019, when federal agencies were closed for 35 days.

The two parties blamed the other for the dysfunction in Washington; Democrats accuse the Republicans of letting health premiums increase for millions of Americans, while the GOP blames the left to put vulnerable Americans in danger while removing the government for partisan demands.

The political strategists that spoke with Fox News Digital, however, have minimized the effects of closing the next 2026 elections.

Here is what Trump wants to reshape the federal government during the closure

The government started a partial closure after the congress did not conclude an agreement on federal funding. (Getty Images)

“Whenever there has been a closure, there have been a myriad of stories about the winners and the losers, who gets blame, what does this mean for the elections, etc. and yet, whenever the result is the same – the voters do not think about the last closure when they vote,” said the GOP strategist, Doug Heye, Fox News.

“The Republicans lost the closure of 2013. The judgment. Impact on the 2014 elections? Zero. This could be different? Maybe. But there is nothing to suggest.”

Others have suggested that the Republicans could see a public blame, but also argued that other questions – namely the economy and the cost of living – would have priority in the minds of voters next year.

Government closed the GOP plan to penalize legislators with a new wage tax

“In the end, what will decide in the middle of next year will be the economy. People are very upset by the economy. They are very upset by inflation. They have been promised that everything was going to become cheaper. Now everything is more expensive,” said Mike Nellis, Democratic strategist and founder of the Fundra and campaigns, an authentic business.

“So I think it will be a much larger decision maker than the government’s closure.”

In the short term, however, Nelis said he saw the Republicans carry the weight of the blame – noting that they controlled the room, the Senate and the White House.

“As a rule, none of the parties seem good during a closure, just in the broad sense. But the power party is blamed for what is happening,” he said.

The president of the room, Mike Johnson, R-La., Expressed the journalists of the White House with the head of the majority of the Senate John Thune, Rs.d., and the vice-president JD Vance behind him during the negotiations with President Trump and the leaders of the Congress on September 29, 2025. (Annabelle Gordon / Bloomberg via Getty Images)

Meanwhile, John Feehery of EFB Advocacy, who was press secretary of the former republican president of the Dennis Chamber J. Hastert, said that Blâme would fall mainly along the party’s parts.

He added that the self -employed, however, would probably blame the GOP, “because they are the ones who generally love closings”.

“I would say that even if the Democrats are clearly to blame for that, because it is their strategy, I think that the Republicans will be blamed a little more than the Democrats,” said Feehery.

On the electoral impacts of 2026, however, he said: “There are winners and losers in the living room games in Washington, but among the American people … They blame both sides, and they do not really seem to remove it on anyone.”

Brad Bannon of the Bannon Communications Research survey company, a democratic strategist, said that inflation would probably matter more than the closure in 2026.

“If prices start to drop, you know, the whole problem would not be a problem for the Republicans, and that will have no impact,” said Bannon. “I think the key question is not the duration of the closure, but how much, in 13 months, inflation continues to be a problem.”

He underlined a recent survey in the Washington Post This has shown that the Republicans were slightly more blamed for the current closure than Democrats in terms of short -term impact.

This survey has shown that 47% of Americans blamed the Republicans, against 30% to blame the Democrats. Twenty-three percent of the people were indecisive.

The head of the minority of the Hakeem Jeffries room, DN.Y., on the left, speaks to the media next to the leader of the Senate of the Senate, Chuck Schumer, DN.Y., President Trump met the best leaders of the congress in the White House in Washington, DC, on September 29, 2025. (Kevin Lamarque / Reuters)

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The closure is ready to enter its second week after the Senate Democrats rejected the GOP plan for the fourth time on Friday.

The measure, called continuous resolution (CR), is a mainly stable extension of seven weeks of current federal funding levels. It would also include $ 88 million in security funding for legislators, the White House and the Judicial Branch – which has bipartite support.

But the Democrats in the House and the Senate were furious while being sidelined in the federal funding talks.

They put pressure on an extension of Obamacare subsidies improved during the COVVI-19 pandemic. These improvements would expire by the end of 2025 without action of the congress.

Republican leaders have pointed out to open up to discussions on reform and improve these health credits, but reject the Democrats’ demand to include them in the seven -week bill.