Progressive-Democrat Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D, NY) is insisting that Republicans are to blame for the ongoing government shutdown.

Republican leadership chose a path they knew would lead to a government shutdown and so far have refused to negotiate a bipartisan deal that would address the healthcare crisis, and find a path forward to reopen the government.

In fact, the Progressive-Democrats guaranteed the shutdown from the start, as confirmed ex post facto, with the House Minority Whip Katherine Clark (D, MA) bragging that suffering families are the Progressive-Democrats’ leverage, Rhode Island Progressive-Democrat Senator Sheldon Whitehouse saying the shutdown is “the only lever we have,” and Schumer bragging that the longer the shutdown continues, the better it is for Democrats.

The Progressive-Democrats claim that they want to negotiate Obamacare subsidy extensions as a condition to their voting to reopen the government. However, it’s their intransigence that’s preventing those discussions from occurring, as they know full well.

The path forward is pretty straightforward. To paraphrase someone, the path forward to reopen the government is to vote to reopen the government. The Republicans have done that. The Progressive-Democrats refuse to do that.