The government will shut down at 12 a.m. on Wednesday if lawmakers do not reach an agreement to extend government funding.
The federal government will begin shutting down at 12 a.m. on Wednesday if lawmakers do not reach an agreement to extend government funding, an outcome that appears more and more likely as the deadline approaches.
Republicans and Democrats have been at odds over how to fund the government as Democrats have pushed for negotiations over health care tax credits to be included in a funding measure. Without an extension or approval of another funding bill, spending authority is set to expire, sending the federal government into a shutdown.
Each agency and department would begin shutdown procedures on Wednesday morning, leading to hundreds of thousands of workers being placed on furlough. Essential employees will stay on the job, but nearly all employees, whether furloughed or not, will go without pay for the duration of the funding lapse.
The likely shutdown is the result of weeks of disagreements between Republicans and Democrats in Washington over funding the government. Here’s the back story:How Congress funds the government
Each year, Congress faces a deadline to approve government funding by the start of a new fiscal year on Oct. 1. The Constitution outlines that Congress must approve any money spent by the federal government. Bills to approve that spending must originate in the House, pass the Senate and be signed by the president before departments and agencies can use the funds.
The government funding process often stretches late into the fiscal year, and in recent decades Congress has nearly always resorted to stopgap measures to keep the government funded in order to give lawmakers more time to approve new spending.
The funding fights often go down to the wire, as the minority looks to use its leverage to extract concessions. But lawmakers also have strong incentives to avoid shutdowns, since they can be economically and politically costly. The last funding lapse stretched from December 2018 until January 2019 and caused a permanent loss of about $3 billion, according to the Congressional Budget Office.
