Here’s what you need to know about the week’s top stories.
Here are the week’s top stories, and a look ahead.
1. It’s a showdown over President Trump’s wall.
The federal government shut down early Saturday after congressional and White House officials could not reach a compromise on a spending bill. The shutdown will continue for the next several days because Senator Mitch McConnell, the majority leader, adjourned the Senate until Thursday. The White House also indicated that Mr. Trump was sticking to his demand for $5 billion for a border wall.
The shutdown has stopped work at nine federal departments and several other agencies. About 380,000 government employees will not be paid, and another 420,000 considered too essential to be furloughed are being forced to work without pay. (Workers have been reimbursed after past shutdowns.) Here’s a look at how the impasse is affecting federal departments .
The shutdown was part of a chaotic series of events in Washington this week, a fitting end for the 115th Congress and a fractious, emotionally charged year.
Have you been keeping up with the headlines? Test your knowledge with our news quiz. And here’s the front page of our Sunday paper, the Sunday Review from Opinion and our crossword puzzles.
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2. President Trump ordered a full withdrawal from Syria, announcing the return of 2,000 American troops and declaring that the U. S. had “defeated ISIS” there.
His decision, announced Wednesday over the objections of military and civilian advisers, fulfills his frequently expressed desire to bring troops home. But it also cedes control of Syria to Russia and Iran, and it abandons America’s Kurdish allies.
Jim Mattis, the defense secretary, resigned in protest of the decision, rattling many. The experience and stability of Mr. Mattis, above right, were widely seen as a balance to an unpredictable president. And Brett McGurk, the top diplomat leading the fight against ISIS, sped up his departure because of the policy shift.
Separately, roughly half of the U. S. troops stationed in Afghanistan will leave in the coming months, defense officials said. The withdrawal comes at a time when the Taliban have been gaining momentum.
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3. Stocks are now in an ominous territory that investors have not seen in nearly a decade: a severe decline known as a bear market.
The good news: The market is well above where it was at the start of 2017. The not-so-good news: The longer that bear markets last, the more pessimism they spread.
