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U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., speaks to the media at the U.S. Capitol on Sept. 30, 2025 in Washington, D.C. Thune was joined by Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., Sen. Shelley Moore Capito, R-W.Va., Sen. John Barrasso, R-Wyo., and Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla. (Photo by Kevin Dietsch\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
This report has been updated.<\/em><\/p>\n WASHINGTON \u2014 The federal government started shutting down early Wednesday after Congress failed to approve a funding bill before the beginning of the new fiscal year \u2014 resulting in widespread ramifications for hundreds of programs and giving the Trump administration an avenue to fire federal workers en masse.<\/p>\n The U.S. Senate was unable to advance two short-term government funding bills Tuesday when Democrats and Republicans deadlocked for the second time this month, with just hours to go before the midnight Tuesday shutdown deadline.<\/p>\n Senators voted 55-45<\/a> on Republicans\u2019 bill that would fund the government for seven weeks and\u00a047-53<\/a> on a Democratic stopgap proposal that would keep the lights on for a month and included several health care provisions that they said were needed for their support. Neither had the 60 votes needed to advance.\u00a0<\/p>\n Nevada Democratic Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. John Fetterman and Maine independent Sen. Angus King voted with GOP senators on their stopgap bill. Kentucky GOP Sen. Rand Paul voted against it.<\/p>\n White House Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought said in a memo<\/a> to departments and agencies Tuesday night after the Senate vote that \u201caffected agencies should now execute their plans for an orderly shutdown.\u201d Vought said federal employees should report for their next regularly scheduled tour of duty to undertake shutdown activities.<\/p>\n The consequences of a shutdown will be sweeping in the nation\u2019s capital and across the country, where states are\u00a0bracing for the impact.<\/a> About\u00a0750,000 federal workers<\/a> could be furloughed, leading to a $400 million impact a day, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office reported. All federal employees would go unpaid until the shutdown is over.<\/p>\n Additionally, the Trump administration\u00a0plans to lay off<\/a> thousands of federal employees, which would reshape the federal workforce. President Donald Trump again vowed Tuesday to undertake layoffs and a major government employee union filed suit in federal court in advance of such a move.<\/p>\n Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said hours before the votes there wouldn\u2019t be any talks with Democrats during a shutdown.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThe negotiation happens when the government is open. So let\u2019s keep the government open and then we will have the negotiations,\u201d Thune said.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re happy to sit down and talk about these issues that they\u2019re interested in,\u201d he said. \u201cBut it should not have anything to do with whether or not for a seven-week period we keep the government open, so that this government can continue to do its work and that we can do our work through the regular appropriations process to fund the government.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n After the votes failed, Thune expressed his frustration with Democrats during a press conference.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThis is so unnecessary and uncalled for,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Thune said he plans to bring up a vote on the continuing resolution again. He said as soon as Wednesday the federal government can be funded if five Democrats voted with Republicans.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cDemocrats may have chosen to shut down the government, but we can reopen it tomorrow,\u201d Thune said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Republican Whip John Barrasso of Wyoming said the \u201ccracks in the Democrats are already showing,\u201d noting that three Democrats voted with Republicans Tuesday night.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThere is bipartisan support for keeping the government open,\u201d Barrasso said. \u201cWe\u2019re happy to see that the Democrats are already starting to break from (Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer) and we\u2019re going to continue to offer a clean (continuing resolution) on the floor of the Senate to open the government for the next seven weeks.\u201d<\/p>\n The disagreement isn\u2019t entirely about GOP lawmakers writing their short-term funding bill behind closed doors and then expecting Democrats to help advance it in the Senate, where bipartisanship is required for major legislation.<\/p>\n Democratic leaders have raised concerns for weeks about the end-of-year sunset of enhanced tax credits for people who buy their health insurance on the Affordable Care Act Marketplace, arguing a solution is needed now ahead of the open enrollment period starting on Nov. 1.\u00a0<\/p>\n Democrats have also grown increasingly frustrated with the White House budget office\u2019s unilateral actions on spending, arguing Vought is significantly eroding Congress\u2019 constitutional power of the purse.\u00a0Sen. Susan Collins of Maine, the Republican chairwoman of the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee,\u00a0said Tuesday\u00a0<\/a>the Government Accountability Office should sue the Trump administration over its efforts to freeze or unilaterally cancel spending approved by Congress.\u00a0<\/p>\n Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said Democrats need an agreement with Republicans to extend the enhanced tax credits.\u00a0<\/p>\n Schumer said people will begin getting notices in October telling them how much the cost of their ACA plans will increase during the next year, which he expects will ratchet up pressure on Republican leaders to broker a bipartisan agreement.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019re going to be right there explaining to them it\u2019s because the Republicans wouldn\u2019t negotiate with us,\u201d Schumer said, referring to consumers. \u201cWe\u2019re ready to do it anytime. And there will be huge heat on (Republicans) on this issue.\u201d<\/p>\n People who buy health insurance on the ACA marketplace and receive subsidies through enhanced ACA tax credits could expect to pay on average more than double for annual premiums in 2026 if the credits expire as scheduled at the end of this year, according to an\u00a0analysis<\/a> released Tuesday by the nonprofit health policy research organization KFF.\u00a0<\/p>\n The analysis found premiums could increase from an average of $888 this year to $1,904 in 2026.<\/p>\n Schumer also rebuffed GOP leaders saying that Democrats want to include people without legal immigration status in federal health care programs.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThey say that undocumented people are going to get these credits. That is absolutely false. That is one of the big lies they tell, so they don\u2019t have to discuss the issues,\u201d Schumer said. \u201cThe federal government by law that we passed does not fund health insurance for undocumented immigrants in Medicaid, nor the ACA nor Medicare. Undocumented immigrants do not get federal health insurance premiums.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Immigrants in the country without legal authorization\u00a0are not eligible<\/a> for Medicaid, and neither are most immigrants with legal status, such as those with student visas or enrollment in the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA.\u00a0<\/p>\n Only immigrants with a\u00a0\u201cqualified status,\u201d<\/a> such as legal permanent residents, asylees and refugees, are able to get Medicaid benefits, and they usually have to wait five years before their coverage can even begin.\u00a0<\/p>\n Cortez Masto of Nevada wrote in a statement explaining her vote to advance the GOP stopgap bill that she could not support \u201ca costly shutdown that would hurt Nevada families and hand even more power to this reckless administration.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWe need a bipartisan solution to address this impending health care crisis, but we should not be swapping the pain of one group of Americans for another,\u201d she added. \u201cI remain focused on protecting health care for working families, and I call on my colleagues on both sides of the aisle to work together to tackle this problem.\u201d<\/p>\n Pennsylvania\u2019s Fetterman wrote in a statement of his own that his vote on the Republican bill \u201cwas for our country over my party.<\/p>\n \u201cTogether, we must find a better way forward.\u201d<\/p>\n Collins said during a brief interview before the vote she is worried about the broad authority the White House holds during a shutdown and how the Office of Management and Budget has indicated it will use that power.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m much more concerned about OMB sending signals that there should be mass firings of federal employees who have the misfortune to be designated as non-essential, when in fact they\u2019re performing very essential work, they\u2019re just not being paid,\u201d Collins said.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n North Dakota Republican Sen. John Hoeven, chairman of the Agriculture spending subcommittee, said lawmakers will have to sort through how various departments implement their contingency plans as well as the possibility of mass layoffs during a shutdown.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019ll have to work through those things and figure out how we do keep things going as best we can during this Democrat shutdown,\u201d Hoeven said.<\/p>\n West Virginia Sen. Shelley Moore Capito said Republicans are \u201cunified in the belief that this is an easy choice\u201d to fund the government with a stopgap bill that doesn\u2019t include any contentious or political provisions.\u00a0<\/p>\n Capito \u2014 who chairs the Appropriations subcommittee that funds the departments of Education, Health and Human Services, and Labor \u2014 said there are several programs that will be \u201cmissed\u201d during a shutdown.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cAnd that\u2019s concerning. So I think the option is to keep the government open so we can avoid this pain,\u201d Capito said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Missouri Republican Sen. Josh Hawley said he is worried about the possible impacts of a shutdown on his home state and that keeping the government open is the only way to avoid that.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m sure the administration will do everything they can,\u201d Hawley said. \u201cBut the solution is to not shut the government down. I mean, why would you punish working people because you\u2019re not getting what you want on any issue, whatever it is.\u201d<\/p>\n South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds said he doesn\u2019t expect a shutdown will end until after Democrats have sent a message to their voters.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not optimistic that we\u2019re going to get a path forward until they\u2019ve had a shutdown,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Rounds, who negotiated a handshake agreement with the White House budget director this summer to preserve some\u00a0funding for rural tribal radio stations<\/a> after Congress eliminated funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, said that deal could be affected by a shutdown.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cThey\u2019re putting the administration in a position where they can pick and choose what they\u2019re going to do, and a shutdown is not going to be beneficial to these Native American radio stations,\u201d Rounds said.\u00a0<\/p>\n Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan said she wants Democrats and Republicans to negotiate on health care provisions.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve been making the case constantly, that (it) is literally my obligation to try and fight for health care, and I\u2019m willing to talk to anyone,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m willing to accept that I certainly will not get everything I want.\u201d<\/p>\n Senate Minority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois said that while Democrats agreed to help advance what\u2019s known as a continuing resolution in March, they can\u2019t now because of \u201cwhat President Trump is doing to this country, particularly when it comes to health care costs for families.\u201d\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n The shutdown will significantly affect the operations of the federal government as lawmakers have not passed any of the dozen full-year appropriations bills that finance agency operations. Oct. 1 is the beginning of the new fiscal year for the federal government.<\/p>\n Departments\u00a0began releasing updated contingency plans<\/a> this weekend, detailing how many of their employees would work during a government shutdown and how many would be furloughed.<\/p>\n The Interior Department, which includes the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and National Park Service,\u00a0posted its updated plans<\/a> late Tuesday.\u00a0<\/p>\n The National Park Service plans to furlough 9,300 of its 14,500 workers.\u00a0<\/p>\n The Trump administration will allow several activities necessary for the protection of life or property to continue, including fire suppression for active fires, permitting and monitoring First Amendment activities, border and coastal protection and surveillance, and law enforcement and emergency response.<\/p>\n The contingency plan says that roads, lookouts, trails, and open-air memorials will generally remain accessible to visitors,\u201d but it adds that if \u201caccess becomes a safety, health or resource protection issue \u2026 the area must be closed.\u201d<\/p>\nMore votes on GOP bill planned<\/h4>\n
Health care tax credits at center of standoff<\/h4>\n
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<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>Claims about immigrants\u00a0<\/h4>\n
Democrats explain why they voted with GOP\u00a0<\/h4>\n
\u2018I\u2019m not optimistic that we\u2019re going to get a path forward\u2019<\/h4>\n
Shutdown plan for national parks<\/h4>\n
Union files suit<\/h4>\n