‘Senate Republicans Should Be Embarrassed’: Ex-Trump Spox Rips GOP for Not Hammering Dems Over Military Pay

Screenshot via The Morning Meeting on YouTube

Former White House press secretary Sean Spicer blasted GOP senators on Friday’s edition of The Morning Meeting, saying they should be “embarrassed” about fumbling their political response after Democrats blocked a bill that would have guaranteed pay for U.S. troops during the ongoing government shutdown.

“Senate Republicans should be embarrassed by how bad they’re messaging this,” Spicer told his co-hosts, Mark Halperin and Dan Turrentine. “They should have been out on the steps last night with military members and Border Patrol… The idea that they voted and bolted is an embarrassment to the Republican Party.”

The bill in question, titled the Shutdown Fairness Act of 2025, was sponsored by Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI) and failed on Thursday in a mostly party-line 54–45 vote, falling short of the 60 votes needed to advance. The legislation would have guaranteed pay for active-duty service members, as well as air traffic controllers, TSA agents, park rangers, ICE and Border Patrol officers, and other essential workers deemed “excepted” from the shutdown.

“What [Senate Republicans] did last night, how they’re messaging this, there’s not another vote — it’s literally the lamest response I’ve ever seen,” continued Spicer, who served as President Donald Trump’s first White House press secretary.

Notably, Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) blasted the bill as a “ruse,” arguing that it would give budget director Russell Vought excessive power to pick and choose which agencies to reopen.

“We will not give Donald Trump a license to play politics with people’s livelihoods,” Schumer said Thursday on the Senate floor.

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