In her rebuttal, Abrams tugged on people’s sympathies about the plight of federal workers. That’s probably not a bad strategy with another shutdown looming if Congress cannot agree on a budget by Feb. 15. A YouGov poll conducted last week found that 81 percent of Americans, including 92 percent of Democrats and 76 percent of Republicans, said they have either “a great deal” or “some” sympathy for federal government employees that were furloughed or working without pay during the government shutdown.
