14-03-2025
Government shutdown looms. Will it affect weather alerts? Social Security? SNAP? Student loans?
The Senate is expected to vote Friday on a stopgap funding bill to keep the U.S. government running. Unlike previous continuing resolution showdowns, this time it's the Democrats who may vote against it in protest of President Donald Trump's policies.
The Republican-controlled House approved the bill by a 217-213 vote on Tuesday, but the Senate requires a supermajority of at least 60 votes to pass. Republicans have 53 seats in the Senate and Sen. Paul Rand, R-Kentucky, has said he'll vote against it. Some Democrats, including Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York and Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania are against a shutdown.
Democrats don't want to be blamed for a shutdown, but are against a funding extension that they say empowers President Donald Trump and Elon Musk to continue cutting government staff and spending.
If the funding bill does not pass, millions of Americans would be affected almost immediately.
The 99-page bill keeps the federal government funded at near-current levels until Sept. 30. If the funding measure is not passed by midnight today, the shutdown would begin at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, March 15.
The federal government has to pay its bills or services stop.
Hundreds of thousands of federal workers will be furloughed without pay for the duration. Some federal workers considered "essential," such as active-duty military, air traffic controllers, etc., are required to continue working without pay but will receive back pay once the shutdown ends.
All federal agencies and services that are not deemed essential will close their doors. Hiring and training of new employees stops. Funding for SNAP and WIC programs stops. New Head Start grants will not be available. Many food, health and clean water inspections from the FDA, OSHA and the EPA would stop. The Small Business Administration stops reviewing or approving loans.
As far as the public is concerned, immediately. For the government employees involved, staff deemed nonessential will have a few hours to secure their files, hand over any information essential employees might need, pay invoices incurred before the shutdown and generally close up shop. If such preparations will take longer than half a day, the Office of Management and Budget must be notified.
Until Congress passes the necessary appropriations bills to fund government services and President Donald Trump signs them, however long that takes.
There have been 21 shutdowns since 1977, with an average of eight days each. The longest government shutdown was 35 days during Trump's first term, from Dec. 22, 2018 to Jan. 25, 2019, the third shutdown to happen during his administration.
The president with the most shutdown days was Jimmy Carter, with 56. The president with the most shutdowns was Ronald Reagan, with eight.
Federal workers who are deemed essential will continue to work, but will not be paid for the duration of the shutdown and will receive back pay when it ends. Some federal employees whose jobs aren't funded by annually appropriated funds will receive their normal pay, according to the U.S. Office of Personnel Management.
However, not everyone can keep working for long without getting paid. If the shutdown continues for an extended period, expect more services to slow or fail due to staffers leaving to find other employment to feed their families.
Yes, but their staffs will be working unpaid. Salaries for members of Congress have been funded by a permanent appropriation since 1983, according to the Congressional Research Service.
The president will also get paid, per Article II, Section I of the U.S. Constitution.
Not in the short term, judging from previous shutdowns. Workers at the National Hurricane Center are considered essential and will be working without pay. But social media posts may be limited to forecast and warning information only.
Meanwhile, hurricane analysis and research on improving forecast models will stop, as will training for new emergency managers and any outreach or education programs.
However, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration which oversees the National Weather Service and the hurricane center has already been forced to lay off nearly 2,000 employees in recent weeks as part of President Donald Trump's mass overhaul of the federal government. It's unclear how this may affect operations and weather forecasts.
While the Federal Emergency Management Agency would still respond to disasters, a federal shutdown would greatly reduce its impact. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell told a House transportation panel in 2023 that a shutdown would restrict the agency to whatever was in its Disaster Relief Fund for existing and new relief efforts.
"We would have to further reduce those types of life-saving operations that we are working on based on the amount of funding that we have available," she said.
The Trump administration has also laid off more than 200 FEMA employees, according to NBC News, and Trump has discussed an interest in abolishing the agency entirely and returning disaster relief to the states.
Active-duty military service members will remain on active duty, including more than 69,000 military personnel in Florida, but they won't be paid until the shutdown is over. However, many other aspects of the U.S. military such as systems testing and production will be affected.
"If the government shuts down, testing [of systems] will stop and acceptance by the government of equipment when it is finished and ready to be accepted [could] stop," William A. LaPlante, Undersecretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment, said last year.
Contracts awarded before the shutdown will continue, according to Reuters, but federal contractors impacted by the shutdown will not be compensated for the time.
No, The U.S. Postal Service is funded by sales of stamps and other services and is not impacted by a shutdown, the USPS said. Mail service will continue and employees will be paid as usual.
No. The Veterans Benefits Administration has received advance appropriations since 2017 and any carryover balances in discretionary accounts can be allocated for current operations, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs. There are over 414,000 VA employees and the department says 96% of them will be fully funded or considered essential and required to work without pay.
VA healthcare payments and pensions will continue, as would the National Cemetery Administration's assorted burial functions. But direct oversight of the NCA's programs would stop. So would IT functions that are deemed necessary, anything beyond basic HR support, representation by the VA Secretary before the courts for veterans claims, any public outreach or education, investigations of misconduct for a VA leader, and multiple oversight and quality review teams.
Social Security recipients will still get their checks, and Medicare benefits will not be interrupted. But employees in those departments may be furloughed on top of any losses in workforce, which may lead to delays in customer service.
To comply with demands from the Trump administration and Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency group, the Social Security Administration announced in February it would be reducing its size by 12%.
The Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, commonly known as SNAP, would continue as long as it has funds but a lengthy shutdown could result in hardships for the nearly 3 million Floridians who receive food safety net benefits.
But funding for the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) would stop immediately, according to former Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack in a press briefing last year. The U.S. Department of Agriculture has a contingency fund that may extend the program for a day or two, and some states may have leftover unspent WIC benefits that could be used to keep it going in that state for up to a few weeks.
Yes. According to the Department of State's contingency plan, consular services such as passports, visas and assisting U.S. citizens abroad will remain "100% operational," as long as there are sufficient fees to support operations. Passport offices that are in larger government buildings may be forced to shut down, however, for lack of access.
Possibly, if the shutdown continues for very long. But short term, you may not notice since TSA agents and air traffic controllers are considered essential employees.
What stops will be development of new air traffic control specialists, facility security inspections, routine background investigations, development and testing of new technologies, air traffic performance analysis, law enforcement assistance support and various other administrative functions.
During previous shutdowns, effects on travel were minimal. However, the Trump administration has fired hundreds of air traffic controllers — although it is now trying to bring more in — and fired more than 200 TSA employees before ending collective bargaining for nearly 50,000 TSA officers last week. It's unclear how long the remaining employees would choose to continue doing the job unpaid if the shutdown stretches on.
Unclear. There are no specific laws requiring them to shut down, although employees would be limited to law enforcement and other necessary personnel. During past shutdowns in 2013 and 2018 the government decided to keep them open and close them down, respectively, and both decisions received backlash.
Last year, the U.S. Coast Guard estimated that most its employees would be retained during the shutdown. All emergency and life-saving functions will continue but any non-essential services will stop.
Yes.
This article originally appeared on Tallahassee Democrat: Government shutdown and services that would be reduced or closed
