§26 —
On the divided country
Democrat
82-15
Now the roll call nobody ran. On 15 January 2026 the Senate passed a three-bill appropriations package 82 to 15, funding Interior, Energy, Commerce and Justice and cutting more than $10 billion 1. The yes votes were 46 Republicans, 35 Democrats and one independent. The no votes were 9 Democrats, 5 Republicans and one independent — a split that ran straight through both parties rather than between them 1. The House had already passed the same package 397 to 28 1.
That is four federal departments funded by better than nine in ten members of the House, six weeks ago, and it is not a story anybody can remember. Which is the actual finding here. The polarization is real on the bills that get filmed, and the appropriations that keep the lights on still clear on numbers that would have looked ordinary in 1974. So the country is not quite as divided as the country believes it is — it is divided on exactly the votes that are worth showing you, and those are the ones it sees. The bills that pass 397 to 28 fund the government. The bills that pass 51 to 50 are the ones you have heard of.
Sources
- The Senate passed a three-bill FY2026 appropriations package 82-15 on 15 January 2026 — 46 Republicans, 35 Democrats and one independent in favor; 9 Democrats, 5 Republicans and one independent opposed — funding Interior, Energy, Commerce and Justice and cutting more than $10 billion; the House had passed it 397-28 — Senate Appropriations Committee ↑
Republican
PARTY LINE
The feeling has a measurement behind it, so nobody should be talked out of it. Roll-call scaling of every member since 1947 shows the ideological overlap between the two parties collapsing from substantial in the 1960s to effectively nothing now 1. That is not a vibe. It is the votes themselves, run through the same arithmetic every year, producing two distributions that no longer touch.
And the landmark bills confirm it in the plainest way available. The Affordable Care Act passed the House without a single Republican vote. The 2017 tax law passed the House without a single Democratic one 1. Those are the two biggest fiscal rewrites of the century so far, and each one was enacted by exactly half the country's representatives. When a majority believes it does not need the other side to pass the thing it most wants to pass, the other side is no longer a partner in the outcome. That is what people are describing when they say it feels like "I won" is the whole governing philosophy now.
Sources
“The divided country. I believe it — I've got the polarization data and the two parties don't overlap anymore, that's measured, that's not a mood. But then I've got this roll call from January fifteenth and I can't make it fit. Eighty-two to fifteen. Forty-six Republicans, thirty-five Democrats, one independent, all yes, on three appropriations bills. The House had already passed it three hundred ninety-seven to twenty-eight. Sorry, one thing before you go. If we agree three hundred ninety-seven to twenty-eight on how to fund the Justice Department, and nobody in the country knows we did — is the division in the chamber, or is it in what gets carried out of it?”— Lou
“Everybody knows nothing gets through anymore, everything's party line, the country's split in half. Then I go look up the roll call. January fifteenth: eighty-two to fifteen in the Senate, three hundred ninety-seven to twenty-eight in the House, funding four departments, ten billion cut. Forty-six Republicans and thirty-five Democrats voted yes on the same afternoon. You didn't hear about it because nobody yells during a 397-vote. The division is real. It's just not where the camera is.”
“There's a great deal of bipartisan cooperation happening every single day that the media simply refuses to cover, and I'd note that the reason they don't cover it is the same reason I don't bring it up on the panels, which is that it isn't interesting.”