The shutdown pain will spiral.
After four weeks in which the real impact of the budget crisis was relatively restricted, a series of deadlines will converge at the turn of the month for a range of programs to feel the effects of the shutdown far beyond the Beltway.
The D-Day moment arriving this weekend is expected to pummel groups as diverse as military troops, ObamaCare patients, children in Head Start and low-income families receiving food stamps.
The merger will affect tens of millions of people, send shock waves across congressional districts and augment pressure on Congress to come together and reach the elusive agreement to end the impasse.
Some of these impacts are already being felt.
Last Friday, most federal workers missed their first full paycheck during the shutdown after receiving only a partial check two weeks earlier. And on Tuesday, air traffic controllers – imperative employees who must report to work – followed suit, forcing some to find second jobs and raising concerns about travel delays ahead of the holidays.
However, the coming days are expected to be even worse.
The government has reallocated funds to pay out October benefits to a federal nutrition program for fresh mothers and children, known as WIC. But this emergency funding is expected to run out by the end of the month. And a huge fight is brewing over the fate of the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), which provides food assistance to millions of low-income people.
Congress has put more than $5 billion into an emergency fund to cover SNAP benefits in emergencies. However, the administration says the fund is reserved for unforeseen events such as natural disasters. The current shutdown is unjustified, Trump officials claim, because it was caused by the Democrats.
“Emergency funds are not legally available to cover regular benefits,” it says a memo issued last week by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which oversees SNAP.
Democrats rejected that legal analysis, saying Congress created the contingency fund for emergencies just like the current budget crisis. If the Trump administration refuses to spend the money, it would be violating federal law designed to ensure appropriated funds go where Congress intended.
“The emergency funding we provided for SNAP is not an optional expense. It is required by law,” Rep. Rosa DeLauro (Conn.), the ranking Democrat on the House Appropriations Committee, told reporters at the Capitol on Tuesday.
“We allocated this money for this purpose. The White House must spend it,” she added. “And what they are doing now, blocking the disbursement of these funds, is illegal.”
On Tuesday, several Democratic state attorneys general sued the government to release the funds. However, it will take some time for the lawsuit to reach court. Meanwhile, withholding SNAP funding would impact more than 40 million low-income people, including about 16 million children, 8 million seniors and 1.2 million veterans.
Patients who benefit from the Affordable Care Act (ACA) will soon feel the impact of gridlock in Congress. The open enrollment period for ObamaCare begins on November 1st. And unless Congress takes action to extend soon-to-expire subsidies passed during the COVID pandemic, premiums and other costs are expected to skyrocket early next year.
The augment would directly impact more than 20 million ACA enrollees, but the impact is likely to reverberate far beyond that as hospitals and other providers scramble to adjust to the expected augment in the number of uninsured patients.
It is this looming cost augment that Democrats must address as a prerequisite for reopening the government. But with Republicans opposed to this provision, there is virtually no chance the issue will be resolved before ACA patients begin considering their plan options for next year.
“Now is the time that people are looking to [how] Your health care costs are going to go up,” Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) said Tuesday.
In Minnesota, she warned, the out-of-pocket copay for a 60-year-old couple will average $15,000 next year.
“People are desperate to renew their health care,” she said. “It’s not December, it’s not next year, it’s November 1st – this Saturday.”
Head Start is another key federal program reportedly on the rocks if the shutdown continues into next month. Currently, about 750,000 low-income children benefit from the program, which provides child care, early education and some health services to children under six. The National Head Start Association warns that almost 10 percent of these students will have to close their schools on November 1 if policymakers in Washington do not intervene.
“Some Head Starts will soon run out of money,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said Tuesday. “I’m starting to hear this.”
And while Trump’s budget team stepped in to ensure payments for the country’s military personnel when the first check was due on October 15, that $8 billion pool is on the verge of drying up.
Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and Vice President Vance have indicated in recent days that the troops would be paid by the end of the week – although probably not November 15 – but the White House has not released information about where that funding would come from.
Ahead of the November storm, both parties are screaming about the impending economic turmoil — and blaming the other for the damage.
Republicans say Democrats will not support the Republican budget bill because they are under intense pressure from the left to deal with President Trump, even if it hurts millions of Americans financially.
“They’re simply afraid of losing their own policy positions next November if they don’t appease the angry, far-left base now,” Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) told reporters Tuesday. “And they will appease this base at all costs, no matter how much pain is inflicted.”
Democrats reject those allegations and say it is Republicans who are endangering Americans’ financial security by refusing to extend the ACA’s expanded tax credits. Democrats simply don’t trust Republicans — who have been trying to repeal ObamaCare for more than a decade — to address the problem before January if it isn’t done now.
“We can solve this crisis quite easily. We could reopen the government and not allow people’s health care premiums to double or triple,” said Representative Jim McGovern (Democrat of Massachusetts) on Tuesday. “That’s it. That’s all they have to do.”
The blame game has left many wondering whether even a combination of factors would be enough to force leaders to the negotiating table.
A wild card in the debate remains Trump himself. While the president met with leaders of both parties on September 29, two days before the shutdown began, he has been on the sidelines ever since, focusing on foreign policy and refusing to negotiate with Democrats until they lend a hand reopen the government.
Trump was in Asia this week, meeting with a number of foreign leaders and is not expected to return to Washington until just before early November.
Democrats say a passive approach is a mistake because Trump’s influence over Republicans is needed to reach an agreement.
“I wish the president would come back from Asia and get everyone in one room,” Dingell said.
