Government Shutdown

Madison Shanfeld
Nov 28, 2025
5 min read

By: Madison Shanfeld

The longest Government shutdown in American history, being 43 days long, ended on November 12, 2025. While the idea and effects of the shutdown have been cycling through the news, it’s imperative we dissect the idea of government shutdowns, and how it has impacted the current political climate.

What is a Government Shutdown

A government shutdown is the temporary closure of government services and agencies due to lapses in congressional funding. This occurs when congress fails to pass, or the President refuses to sign, the necessary appropriation bills, or bills assigning money for specific governmental purposes, to fund federal operations. This failure to pass bills leads to a period in time where no money has been appropriated, and the government must shut

down because they don’t have the allotted amount of money to continue functioning.

During a shutdown, non-essential employees, typically part of the civil service, are suspended from work and not given pay, while more essential employees must continue

working without immediate compensation, and wait for their paycheck until the shutdown ends. There are also impacts on public services: national parks shut down, delays in loans, permits, and inspections are common, immigration hearings are cancelled, and social programs are suspended .

A shutdown is not officially ended until an appropriations bill is passed by Congress and signed by the President, however, Congress does have the power to pass a continuing resolution to temporarily appropriate funding while discussion over the full year fiscal budget continues. Typically, once shutdowns end, those suspended from work are retrospectively compensated for their time off.

What Caused the 2025 Shutdown

To understand why this session of Congress could not pass the necessary appropriations, it is important to visualize the political composition of seats. In the House of

Representatives, the Republican party holds the majority by only 5 seats, with 219 of the total

435 seats. In the Senate, Republicans hold the majority by only 3 seats, occupying 53 of the 100 seats available. These proportions are important because in order to pass an appropriations bill in both chambers of Congress, the bill needs a simple majority, or over 50% of the votes. With such slim differences in number of seats between the parties, even when factoring in independent members, it would require almost every single member of the majority party to agree to pass the bill, which is becoming increasingly rare as political polarization within parties increases. This is further complicated by the possible filibusters, or prolonged periods of speaking to kill a bill, in the Senate. Because of filibusters, the Senate essentially needs 60% of the votes to pass a bill as it takes 60% of the Senate to end a filibuster, or acquire cloture. No party has a 60% majority and the odds of the entire party agreeing are slim, thus passing an appropriations bill through both chambers of Congress has been incredibly difficult, and led to the occurrence of the shutdown.

In addition to the composition of the 119th congress, or the current congressional session, partisan divides on how to allocate funding are also at play now. While polarization within parties has already been mentioned, a majority of the polarization is between parties. While the parties have been fundamentally different in the past, the modern political arena has showcased unprecedented levels of polarization. From domestic to foreign policy, there is little to no opinions that candidates or parties share, causing the allotment of budget to be difficult to agree on.

The particular partisan disagreements with the 2026 fiscal year budget occurred primarily in the funding for healthcare and social programs. Unsurprisingly, the Democratic

party wanted to reverse the spending cuts on Medicaid, the social healthcare program for low-income Americans, and aimed for an extension of the Affordable Care Act subsidies, or an extension of healthcare tax credits. They cited that without these credits, millions of Americans will be unable to afford coverage. On the other side, the Republican party had the

larger goal of reducing overall government spending, which directly conflicts with the ideas of the Democrats to reverse previous spending cuts. They wanted to save taxpayer money, eliminate what they deemed as waste, and practice fiscal conservatism. Additionally, many Trump-supporting Republicans dislike the idea of going against the President’s previous actions against Medicaid. These two ideas of how government money should be spent, and how much money should be spent almost directly contradict each other, yet again increasing the difficulty to pass appropriation bills.

When the proportions of seats are paired with the increased political polarization in Congress, it is easy to see why the bills couldn’t pass and why the 2025 government shutdown occurred.

What Ended the 2025 Shutdown

The house passed a 2026 funding bill with a 222-209 vote, and the Senate passed it with a 68-32 vote. Once the bill was signed by President Trump on November 12, 2025, the shutdown was officially over.

Within this bill was full year funding for the Department of Agriculture, the Department of Veterans Care, the legislative branch, and some Department of Defense operations. In order to get the bill passed, the other parts of the government were only provided with short term funding until January 30th, 2026 and backpay was agreed upon for the federal employees who haven't been receiving paychecks.

However, the issue for the Affordable Care Act tax credits has not been fully resolved, as there will be another vote regarding their extension in December. As of now, the tax credits are set to expire at the end of 2025.

Now that the government has one appropriations bill passed, further discussion over specificities, like tax credits, can occur.

How the Shutdown Changes the Political Climate

While political polarization was a cause for the shutdown, it is also an impact. The

disagreements over budgets and allotment have only exacerbated the already present tension between the Democrats and Republican parties, with both using budget as a means to exert power or dominance over the other within a slim majority session of Congress. Additionally, both parties have put a lot of responsibility on the other as the cause of the shutdown. The House Appropriations committee was accusing the Democrats for causing the shutdown while the Democratic party claimed the Republican leaders held responsibility, because they needed to be more focused on compromise. This sentiment has spread to Democrats and Republicans around the country. 72% of Republicans say Democrats are dishonest, and 82% say Democrats are closed-minded. On the other side, 65% of Democrats claim Republicans are dishonest, and 85% claim Republicans are closed-minded. The government shutdown has only increased the political polarization that is running rampant in modern US politics.

The Shutdown has also decreased the public’s trust in the government to protect and function. With a dysfunctional government for 43 days, it is reasonable to see how the

citizens of America can become disheartened and untrusting that the government will be capable of protecting their rights and continuing to pass policies in their favor. PBS polls claim that only 1 in 5 Americans has trust in congress after the shutdown: that is only 20% of the total US population. In fact, after the 43 day stalemate, confidence in the entirety of the government has decreased, with 61% lacking confidence in the presidency, 62% in the Supreme Court Justices, and 75% in the media.

Importance of Understanding

This is not the first shutdown in American history, nor will it be the last given how politics are continuing to trend. Learning to understand what a shutdown is, what causes it, and the possible impacts will make the next shutdown less confusing and overwhelming, as well as prepare you for those imminent impact.