Federal government shutdowns are not good. But in these messed up times, we’ve got to shut it down!
Written by Josh Ishimatsu
The deadline for passing the FY 25-26 Federal Budget is the end of this month.
If Congress doesn’t pass and if the president doesn’t sign a budget by September 30th, we have 2 options: (1) Congress could pass a Continuing Resolution to keep the government funded at current levels to buy more time while a budget agreement is finalized or (2) the government could go into shutdown.
Because of procedural rules, passing the budget requires 60 votes in the Senate, giving the minority party (Democrats, currently) leverage during budget negotiations when some number of them are needed to get final budget approval. This also means that, if the minority party’s Senators stand unified, they can force a government shutdown.
Last week, Ezra Klein published an opinion piece saying that Democratic Senators should force a shutdown. Klein argues that Democrats should use the shutdown to draw attention to and try to stop the most egregious of Trump’s unconstitutional and authoritarian actions. Matthew Iglesias, another center-left pundit, also argued last week that Dems should force a shutdown, but, instead, use it to restore Trump’s healthcare cuts.
Not that I have anywhere near the reach or influence of Ezra Klein or Matthew Iglesias, but I too want Democratic Senators to shut down the government. I care less than either of them about what the specific stated demands for the shutdown should be. There probably should be some demands. The demands should be related to programs or principles that are important and popular enough that a substantial chunk of Americans understand that they are worth drastic action. And the demands should be sufficiently big that they wouldn’t be met right away and that it feels like a victory if they are won. Unfortunately, there are a lot of big, important things at risk right now and lots of things could be a legitimate basis to force a shutdown.
In usual times, I am against federal government shutdowns. Federal shutdowns are not good. Most federal employees don’t get paid. Most federal programs are paused. The human and economic costs are huge – diminished GDP, for example, can be estimated in billions of dollars per day of shutdown. In usual times, I generally think that any political points won in a shutdown (such that they are) are not worth the human and economic costs. But we are far from usual times. Our current moment requires bolder and more explicit resistance.
Many of us in the social/nonprofit sector have taken an under the radar approach to respond to this Trump administration. For e.g., in response to the executive orders against DEI, many nonprofits who receive federal funding hastily scrubbed their websites while privately committing to continue their work, believing that they could continue to get funded, outlast Trump’s attention span, and then go back to normal once he’s moved on. This tactical approach is premised on what happened during President Trump’s first term, when much of his agenda was left unfinished due to his lack of discipline and competence (and then a pandemic happened near the end of his first stint in office).
But Trump 2.0 is different from Trump 1.0. It’s a different judicial context – one in which the current Supreme Court consistently demonstrates their enthusiasm to overturn established precedent to give Trump whatever he wants (see the recent decision overturning the 90-year old Humprey’s Executor ruling, for e.g.). Last term, there were a few cabinet members with legitimate public/military service experience who reigned in some of Trump’s excesses. This time, it is enablers, sycophants, and worse all the way down. Last time, I don’t think Trump expected to win, and he came into office unprepared and disorganized. This time, the Trump administration came into office with a pretty detailed blueprint – i.e., Project 2025 – which they’ve been following relatively closely and having a lot of success implementing. Their dashboard is at almost 50% done and they are less than one year into the term.
This administration’s roll is not slowing, and I don’t think the under the radar approach is sustainable. If you are a CDFI, for example, and you scrubbed your website of the initials DEI in hopes of continuing to receive federal funding, you might think under-the-radar is still working. In the current budget year, the CDFI fund might be safe – the President recommended to zero it out but Congress (so far) has continued to keep it in the budget and, also, it would continue to be funded under most likely Continuing Resolution scenarios. This year may be okay for the CDFI fund but the Trump administration is going to keep trying to eliminate it, no matter what letters are or aren’t on your website. If we don’t take stronger actions to stop them before they get more momentum, we’re screwed! Cutting Medicaid in favor of tax cuts for billionaires shows that there are no more sacred cows. If Medicaid can be cut, the CDFI fund is not safe. Nor is HOME or CDBG or the Continuum of Care or housing vouchers or any other housing or community development program that we rely upon. No social safety net program is safe.
And beyond budgets and federal programs, we are not safe! This government is now routinely violating people’s Constitutional rights, constantly pushing the boundaries of social norms and legal processes, trying to get away with more and more and more. There is no bottom to how low they will go unless and until we force them to stop.
Shutting down the government is not a magic bullet. But it will show that we are willing to take drastic measures. It will communicate to the broader public that what is happening is not normal or acceptable. It will diminish the permission environment that allows the current administration to keep moving forward with the next outrageous thing.
Please contact the Democratic leadership in the Senate and tell them to Shut It Down!