House Democrats are convening a virtual caucus call tonight, April 6, to plot their next steps on the DHS shutdown, now 51 days old and the longest partial government shutdown in US history.

House Democrats are holding a virtual DHS shutdown caucus call tonight at the start of a critical week, according to Punchbowl News, as the chamber returns from a two-week Passover and Easter recess with no resolution in sight. The shutdown, which began February 14, crossed 51 days on April 6, making it the longest partial government shutdown in the country’s history. Democrats support the Senate-passed bill that funds most of DHS while excluding ICE and CBP, and leadership does not expect significant defections from that position.

The Senate passed a funding deal by voice vote in the early hours of last Friday after a marathon overnight session, threading the needle on Democrats’ core demand: funding the department without allocating money to ICE or the Border Patrol. Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer both backed the measure. But the House rejected it.

Speaker Mike Johnson instead put forward a 60-day stopgap that would fund all of DHS, including ICE and CBP. Senate Democrats immediately declared it dead. “Our position remains the same,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries said. “There is a bipartisan bill that every single senator, Democrats and Republicans, supported, that has the votes to pass today.”

The Real Costs on the Ground

The shutdown has produced measurable damage. The TSA callout rate is running five times above its normal level. More than 480 transportation security officers have quit since February, and some major airports are operating with 40 to 50 percent of their expected workforce absent on any given day. Wait times exceeding four and a half hours have been recorded at some of the country’s busiest terminals. Estimated economic losses now stand at $2.5 billion, according to Republican appropriators who cited the figure in a recent floor statement.

As crypto.news reported when the earlier DHS funding lapse rattled markets in February, the shutdown’s spillover into economic data releases and Federal Reserve signaling can create cascading uncertainty across financial markets well beyond the political standoff itself.

How Both Sides Got Here

The shutdown traces back to the killing of a US citizen by a Customs and Border Protection agent in Minneapolis in January 2026. Senate Democrats announced they would no longer support the DHS funding bill, which funds CBP, demanding reforms to immigration enforcement as a condition. Trump has repeatedly refused to negotiate on reopening DHS unless Democrats back the SAVE America Act, his voter ID and proof-of-citizenship legislation, which is a non-starter for the minority.

Tonight’s caucus call will test how unified House Democrats remain heading into the second week of return from recess, and whether any moderates are ready to move. As crypto.news noted when the 43-day fall 2025 shutdown finally ended, the resolution of prolonged political standoffs tends to produce sharp market relief rallies across risk assets.

“Throughout it all, Senate Democrats stood united — no wavering, no backing down,” Schumer said Friday after the Senate vote.

Bitcoin (BTC) is trading within a bear flag pattern that projects a breakdown toward the sub-$50,000 area, or roughly 30% below current levels. However, Michael Saylor’s Strategy could spoil the bears’ plans.

Key takeaways:

• Bitcoin has avoided a bear flag breakdown for weeks as Strategy keeps buying BTC.

• The setup now resembles Bitcoin’s 2018 bottom, when a bearish pattern failed and triggered a reversal.

Can Strategy’s BTC buying offset weak technicals?

Normally, a bear flag remains a bearish continuation pattern because there is not enough demand to overcome the broader downtrend.

In Bitcoin’s case, however, Strategy has been taking supply off the market faster than miners can replace it.

Since March 2, Strategy’s Bitcoin holdings have risen by 46,233 BTC, while miners have produced only about 16,200 BTC over the same period, meaning it has absorbed nearly thrice the new supply.

Much of that demand has come through STRC, Strategy’s variable-rate preferred stock. When STRC held near or above its $100 par value, Strategy kept issuing shares and accumulating BTC.

For instance, last week, Strategy raised $102.6 million through STRC sales to help fund a Bitcoin purchase worth over $330 million. BTC’s price has jumped by over 6.65% ever since.

During March 9–13, STRC sales raised about $776 million, enough to buy over 11,000 BTC, while Bitcoin rose more than 7% even as the S&P 500 fell 1.6%. The same period saw BTC’s price rising over 10.5%.

But when STRC slipped below par in mid-March, issuance slowed. Earlier below-par episodes had coincided with 25%–40% BTC pullbacks, including a nearly 40% drop over three weeks after a January pause.

Bitcoin’s long-term holders and whales drove much of the selling.

Bear flag failure could set stage for rally to $110,000

Bitcoin remains inside a bear flag after a sharp decline, but the pattern would begin to fail if price breaks above the upper trendline near the mid-$70,000 area.

That breakout would invalidate the immediate bearish continuation setup and shift focus to the bullish measured-move target near $108,000-$110,000.

A similar pattern failure occurred near Bitcoin’s 2018 bottom, when a rising wedge pattern led to a breakout instead of a breakdown.

Another factor supporting the upside case is Bitcoin’s position near its 200-week simple moving average (200-week SMA, the blue wave). In 2018, Bitcoin bottomed out near this level and rose by over 1,975% afterward.

As of 2026, the 200-week SMA has capped Bitcoin’s downside attempts successfully, raising the odds of a 2018-like bottom formation.

Related: Strategy’s STRC stock trading surge: How much Bitcoin can Saylor buy?

Some analysts anticipate BTC to rise to $400,000 if Strategy continues buying BTC at its current rate.