(CNN) President Donald Trump may be looking for a fight over the border wall ahead of the midterm election, but Senate Republicans -- mindful of protecting their majority -- are rebuffing the President's call for a government shutdown, at least for now.

"It's a negotiating tactic. I hope it's a negotiating tactic," Sen. John Thune, a Republican from South Dakota, told reporters Monday. "We're just going to try and get our work done and get it done on time. Hopefully they President will sign those bills."

It's the latest sign that the President's own party is learning to adapt -- or simply ignore -- Trump's sporadic legislative impulses. Instead of careening from one item on Trump's Twitter wish list to another, Republican senators filed back to Washington Monday evening (House members are on recess until September) as committed as ever to their spending bill strategy: pass as many appropriations bills as possible ahead of the midterms and then turn to a stopgap funding measure known as a continuing resolution for the rest until the elections are over.

"I know he's frustrated, and I am too, that we haven't taken steps to adequately deal with border security, but we've got an orderly appropriations process going through here and hopefully we'll get most if not all of the appropriations done before," Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn said.

The brief shock of the shutdown tweet over the weekend seemed to be steadily easing into Monday. One aide characterized Trump's tweet as "just letting off some steam ... at our expense, per usual." Another, a senior GOP aide who was asked if it changed the strategy moving forward, simply said no.

Read More