The U.S. government shut down at midnight on Wednesday, beginning funding stoppages that are expected to ripple through federal agencies, disrupting many government services and putting perhaps tens of thousands out of work.
The closure came amid an bitter impasse between congressional Democrats and Republicans, who are backed by President Donald Trump, over whether an extension of federal funding should include health care provisions.
The Senate late on Tuesday rejected in a 55-45 vote a 7-week stopgap funding measure supported by Republicans that would have allowed the government to continue operations. That was their second attempt of the night, after voting on a bill supported by Democrats. Hours later, the shutdown began.
As the government closed, rhetoric became heightened from both sides of the aisle, with each party and their allies pointing the blame at their counterparts — each claiming the opposing party “owns” the shutdown.
“Democrats have officially voted to CLOSE the government,” House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, said on social media, following the Senate vote.
Democratic National Committee Chair Ken Martin said the shutdown amounted to “the clearest sign yet that Republicans are inept, incompetent, and lack any respect for the American people.”
Democrats mostly hung together to deny the votes necessary to keep the government funded as they continue to say that any funding solution must include health care related provisions. Several Democrats crossed party lines and voted in favor of the clean-funding bill.
Sen. Chuck Schumer, the minority leader, said after the vote and prior to the shutdown that Democrats wanted 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.”
“It’s the Republicans who will be driving us straight towards a shutdown tonight, and at midnight, the American people will blame them for bringing the Federal Government to a halt,” he added.
Former Vice President Kamala Harris in social media post said, “Republicans are in charge of the White House, House, and Senate. This is their shutdown.”
Republican National Committee Chair Joe Gruters meanwhile pointed the blame at Democrats, saying they were “solely responsible” for the shutdown.
“Democrats are holding up critical funding for our veterans, seniors, law enforcement, and working families because they want to pass a far-left wish list costing more than $1 trillion,” he said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the committee, Sonali Patel, echoed Gruters, saying the Domcrats in the Senate “caved to the far-left, played partisan politics, and forced this shutdown.”
“They own it,” Patel said.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said at a press conference after Tuesday’s failed votes that Republicans are now in the hunt for a few additional Democrats to support their clean, short term funding bill after three Democrats defected during tonight’s vote.
Sens. John Fetterman, Catherine Cortez Masto and Angus King — an independent who caucuses with Democrats — had bucked their party leader and voted with Republicans on a short-term funding bill aimed at keeping the government open for 7 more weeks.
Thune said he intends to bring that bill forward for a vote again tomorrow. And he believes more Democrats might be willing to support it.
“There are others out there, I think who don’t want to shut down the govt but who are being put in a position by their leadership that should make them, ought to make all of them very uncomfortable,” Thune said.
He added, “So we’ll see. I think that tonight was evidence that there was some movement there and will allow our democrat colleagues to have additional opportunities to vote on whether or not to keep the government open, or in the case of tomorrow now probably to open it back up.”
ABC News’ Justin Gomez and Lauren Peller contributed to this report.
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