Government Shutdown

The United States government went into a Federal shutdown at midnight on October 1st, after congress failed to approve spending legislation. The shutdown follows both parties' dispute over healthcare and spending priorities. 

Republicans introduced extending government funding at current levels until November 21 in order to allow for members to continue to work on full year appropriations bills. Democrats made a proposal to keep the government open through the month of October, yet attached health care requirements and restrictions of President Trump’s authority to withhold funding.

Federal money for healthcare expired, a spending bill would extend healthcare funding under the Affordable Health Care Act and reversed reductions to Medicaid failed. The GOP- backed stopgap funded measures which could have funded the Government for seven weeks failed as well.  

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer urged Republicans to go to the negotiating table following the upper chamber's failure to pass measures to avoid a Federal shutdown. 

"We want to sit down and negotiate, but the Republicans can't do it in their partisan way, where they just say it's our way or the highway," Schumer said. 

Many Americans feel as if each side is blaming the other for a lack of bipartisanship. 

“First of all, this happens all the time, so I think that if both sides just decide that they're going to blame the other side. But there is this one quote that's really clear from President Trump’s first term where he says if the Republicans own the House and the Senate and the executive branch and the President. The President has to figure this one out. So there has to be some negotiating in order to get people back to work,” NHS History teacher Larry Saladin said. 

Congressional Democrats have refused to give the Republicans the votes they need in order to pass short term funding, demanding overhauls to Medicaid cuts and additions to health care tax credits. 

Several government services are temporarily paused and about 750,000 people are expected to be placed on unpaid leave. Thousands of essential workers will be left with no pay yet still mandated to report to work. This includes airport security, air traffic controllers, and some members of the military. National parks close and museums such as the Smithsonian closed within the first few days. 

Federal contractors such as janitors and security guards are required to pay but not guaranteed a paycheck. Lawmakers continue to get paid. 

Social security, Medicare and Medicaid all continue to be issued though there are some slow downs. 

The FDA can’t guarantee that meat, milk and eggs from livestock are safe to consume. 

“Its really sad because we don't really feel it here because you know, teachers are working and doing what we need to do but ultimately there’s a lot of people who live paycheck to paycheck in America,” Saladin said. 

A government shutdown occurs when Congress fails to pass funding for agencies and can not spend money that has not been approved by lawmakers. There have been a total of 14 Federal shutdowns since 1980, that latest being 34 days in 2018. 

In a shutdown the government suspends all non essential functions until funding is approved by Congress and signed into law. 

“I just think it's unfortunate that no one understands what a government shutdown actually is, and that there are lots of people out of work, can't pay their bills, or losing out on money. Which most of them get retroactively, but it doesn't help when the bill is due. And you get fines and late fees and things like that. So I think that part is unfortunate. And they should limit the amount of stuff they're trying to deal with and do what they need to do to get the budget passed and deal with outside issues outside of our budget,” NHS History teacher Candice Dietter said.