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- The US government shut down 11 days ago. It’s not clear when it will reopen.
- Federal workers have begun missing pay, and the Trump administration has begun laying workers off.
- At the center of it all is healthcare. Here’s what to know about the ongoing shutdown.
The US government shut down 11 days ago, and there’s little indication that it’s going to reopen anytime soon.
Much of the federal government continues to operate, though some services have been impacted. Hundreds of thousands of employees are working without pay, and on Friday, the Trump administration began laying some of those workers off.
And while a 2019 law guarantees federal workers back pay after the end of a shutdown, the Trump administration has raised the possibility that those who have been furloughed will not receive it, at least without an act of Congress.
Despite all of this, lawmakers have not gotten any closer to an agreement. Democrats continue to insist that Republicans work with them to address a looming healthcare crisis in order to secure their votes to reopen the government.
Here’s what to know about the ongoing shutdown.
The impact of the ongoing shutdown
As of now, the impact of the shutdown on the general public has been relatively light.
Social security checks are still going out, student loan borrowers are still required to make payments, post offices remain operational, and national parks have mostly remained open. However, Smithsonian museums and the National Zoo in Washington, DC, are set to shutter on Sunday for the remainder of the shutdown.
While hundreds of thousands of federal workers have been sent home, Capitol Hill staffers have largely remained on the job, with each member of Congress having broad discretion to declare their employees “essential” and exempt them from furloughs.
“For us, it’s going to be business as usual,” Republican Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri told BI last week. “Everybody else in the country is working. So we’ve got to be here and be working.”
On Friday, the Trump administration began making good on the mass firings that they said could come as a result of the shutdown. But Democrats seemed largely unfazed by that, arguing that the administration wasn’t doing so out of necessity.
“They don’t have to do it; they want to,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement. “They’re callously choosing to hurt people—the workers who protect our country, inspect our food, respond when disasters strike. This is deliberate chaos.”
The Trump administration has also moved to pause billions of dollars in federal funding for infrastructure projects in New York and Illinois, a move widely seen as an attempt to place pressure on Democratic leaders.
Some airports across the country are beginning to experience significant delays due to shutdown-caused staffing shortages among air traffic controllers.
A stalemate on Capitol Hill
Three weeks ago, House Republicans passed a party-line bill to fund the government through November 21. Senators have voted on that bill seven times since then — and it’s failed every time.
That’s because it takes 60 votes to pass the bill in the Senate, and not enough Democrats are joining with Republicans to pass it.
On Capitol Hill, there’s been little movement. Leaders in both parties have held daily press conferences, the same votes have been taken, and Speaker Mike Johnson has kept the House out of session in an effort to pressure Democratic senators to accept the GOP bill.
All the while, President Donald Trump has remained relatively unengaged with the crisis, deferring instead to his GOP allies in Congress.
Democrats have held firm in insisting that Republicans work with them to address the looming expiration of Affordable Care Act tax credits, which are set to cause massive premium spikes for millions of Americans.
Republican leaders have said that they’re willing to address the issue, but only once the government is reopened. Democrats, unwilling to give up their leverage, have refused.
So how does this all end?
The longest shutdown in American history spanned from the end of 2018 through the beginning of 2019. It lasted 35 days before ending in part due to issues with the country’s air travel, as a growing number of air traffic controllers called in sick.
Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine of Virginia speculated that if that happens again, it could pressure President Trump to try to cut a deal.
“The success of commercial aviation is so key to the American economy, the way things work, that was sort of a motivator,” Kaine said of the 2019 shutdown. “You’re starting to see that issue come up, and I think that could be the positive pressure point that will get him engaged and help us find a resolution.”
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