The federal government has been in a partial shutdown since Oct. 1 because intransigent Senate Democrats refuse to support a "clean" short-term funding bill, devoid of add-ons and passed weeks ago by the House, that would simply extend current spending levels through November.

On Thursday, the Senate voted for a seventh time on the House-passed bill, but it once again failed to reach the required 60-vote threshold, falling a few votes short at 54-45, according to The Hill.

As in those previous failed votes, three members of the Democratic caucus bucked party leadership and crossed the aisle to vote in support of the Republican-backed bill, while one GOP senator did the reverse and joined the Democrat opposition to the measure.

Vote to reopen the government falls short ... again

In a floor speech ahead of Thursday's vote, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) said, "This isn’t a political game. Democrats might feel that way, but I don’t know of anybody else that does. The longer this goes on, the more the American people realize that Democrats own this shutdown."

His words largely fell on deaf ears, as when it came time to vote, only Sens. John Fetterman (D-PA), Catherine Cortez Masto (D-NV), and Angus King (I-ME) flipped to join their Republican counterparts in voting to reopen the government. Meanwhile, as he's consistently done for principled reasons in the prior votes, Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) voted against the funding bill alongside most Democrats.

Notably, the Senate also again considered a Democrat-backed proposal to reopen the government -- which extends expired Obamacare subsidies and restores $1 trillion in Medicaid cuts, some of which fund free healthcare for illegal aliens -- but that bill also failed with a vote count of 47-50.

Schumer, most Democrats remain unmoved

Senate Democrats have been decidedly recalcitrant toward Republicans on the shutdown issue, and at least for now, they've shown no signs of any willingness to back down from their obstinate opposition, according to The Hill.

In fact, just days earlier, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) declared in a video that there was "no f--king way" his party would support the House-passed funding bill, as they viewed the matter as "literally life or death. We will not let Republicans blow up our health care system."

Part of the reason for that defiant stance is the public polls that predictably suggest that Republicans have shouldered most of the blame from Americans for shutting down the government -- as is virtually always the case, thanks to biased reporting from the liberal media -- though that doesn't mean that Democrats are viewed as innocent bystanders, either.

Polls show both parties blamed

Indeed, NBC News reported that several recent polls show that solid majorities of the American people hold both parties and the president at least somewhat responsible for the shutdown.

For example, an Economist/YouGov poll from Oct. 4-6 found that 64% said Republicans or both parties were equally to blame, while 53% said Democrats or both parties were to blame. Likewise, a CBS News/YouGov survey from Oct. 1-3 revealed that 70% pointed to the GOP or both parties as responsible for the shutdown, while 61% held the Democrats or both parties at fault.

Interestingly enough, though, a Reuters/Ipsos poll from Oct. 3-7 found that a combined 84% of Americans said Democrats deserved a "fair amount" or "a little" of the blame for the shutdown, while a combined 83% believed the same about Republicans, and combined 80% signaled as much about President Donald Trump.

Schumer's "vile sentiment" slammed

As those polls show, Americans largely believe that Democrats are just as much at fault for the shutdown as Republicans, yet, according to The Hill, Sen. Schumer told Punchbowl News of the blame game on Wednesday that "Every day gets better for us."

Vice President JD Vance reacted to that remark in an X post on Thursday, and wrote, "Better for Schumer. Worse for Americans. What a vile sentiment from an alleged leader in our country."