{"database": "press", "table": "releases", "rows": [["https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=4091FB3C-62F6-494B-B932-3C83EA491575", "Thune: Will Democrats Finally Take Yes for an Answer?", "2025-11-04", "2025", "2025-11", "Republican", "Senate", "SD", "John Thune", "T000250", "www.thune.senate.gov", "thune", "https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases", "scraper", "Clickhereto watch the video.\n\nWASHINGTON \u2014 U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) today spoke at a press conference with Senate Republican leadership:\n\nThune\u2019s remarks below (as delivered):\n\n\u201cWe are now in the 35th day of the shutdown.\n\n\u201cThe longest shutdown on record and the most severe shutdown on record \u2013 something that was totally unnecessary in the first place, obviously.\n\n\u201cBut we\u2019re hoping this will be the week when the Democrats come to their senses and decide to reopen the government.\n\n\u201cOf course, if you look at why we are here in the first place, it\u2019s hard to explain \u2026 I still don\u2019t know exactly what it is they want.\n\n\u201cWe have accommodated a lot of their questions and concerns.\n\n\u201cThey want to have a discussion about health care, we offered that up a long time ago.\n\n\u201cAnd, you know, clearly, we\u2019ve talked, I\u2019ve talked repeatedly about having a normal appropriations process where we put bills on the floor, open it up to the amendment process, and allow people to have their voices heard in how we fund the government the old-fashioned way.\n\n\u201cBut so I\u2019m still at a loss as to what it is exactly they\u2019re trying to get out of this.\n\n\u201cThe one thing I do know is, as the days roll by, the consequences and pain of this shutdown grow more severe for the American people, and especially if you are a government employee or the family of a government employee who\u2019s no longer getting paid.\n\n\u201cThere are more and more stories of people out there who are trying to live paycheck to paycheck, and now you\u2019ve got the food assistance going away, the SNAP program.\n\n\u201cYou have Head Start and young kids who need to be able to have access to education, that\u2019s increasingly at risk.\n\n\u201cYou\u2019ll see more and more, probably next week, with Veterans Day rolling around, Democrats out there posting nice videos and photos with veterans, which most of us probably should and will do \u2013 but the better thing they could do is actually support our veterans by opening up the government.\n\n\u201cAnd allowing these regional offices to get \u2026 open again, and allow the GI Bill hotline to start functioning and operating again.\n\n\u201cThere are so many ways in which Americans are impacted by this, and certainly our veterans and our troops come to mind immediately.\n\n\u201cSo I\u2019m hopeful, again, that this is the week in which the Democrats will conclude that this is not a good thing.\n\n\u201cAnd while they may believe politically that it\u2019s in their best interest \u2013 and obviously we\u2019ve seen lots of statements that suggest that \u2013 it\u2019s certainly not in the best interest of the American people.\n\n\u201cThe American people are those who are caught up in the political games being played here in the Senate by the Senate Democrats.\n\n\u201cAll it takes is five of them.\n\n\u201cWe have a bill sitting at the desk, which we\u2019ve voted on repeatedly, that came over from the House of Representatives, meaning that as soon as the Senate passes it, it goes directly to the president.\n\n\u201cHe will sign it into law, the government will reopen, and all these adverse consequences that are being experienced by people across this country will go away.\n\n\u201cThat\u2019s all it takes \u2013 five more Democrats, five Democrat senators with the courage to take on their political base and their leaders and to do what\u2019s in the best interest the American people.\u201d", 1, "2026-03-30T01:40:41Z", "2026-04-06T19:52:45Z"]], "columns": ["url", "title", "date", "year", "month", "party", "chamber", "state", "member_name", "bioguide_id", "domain", "scraper", "source", "date_source", "text", "has_text", "collected_at", "updated_at"], "primary_keys": ["url"], "primary_key_values": ["https://www.thune.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=4091FB3C-62F6-494B-B932-3C83EA491575"], "units": {}, "query_ms": 1.379610039293766, "source": "dwillis/congress-press", "source_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press", "license": "MIT", "license_url": "https://github.com/dwillis/congress-press/blob/main/LICENSE"}