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Friends,
As of 12:01 a.m. Eastern Time today, the United States government is closed. Crucial government services aren’t delivered. Federal employees are furloughed without pay (apart from workers who are deemed “essential”).
Republicans had tried to push a temporary funding bill — a Continuing Resolution, or CR. But the CR had within it all the terrible parts of Trump’s big beautiful (Ugly!) bill, including major cuts in health care, nutrition assistance, and environmental protection, all to fund a huge tax cut mainly for the wealthy.
The only reason the big ugly passed the Senate in early July was a special procedure that required only 51 senators. Republicans bragged at the time that they didn’t need any Democrats (JD Vance was the tiebreaker).
Now Republicans do need Democrats to fund the government and continue those big ugly policies.
As a condition for signing on, Democrats have demanded that Affordable Care Act subsidies be extended and that cuts Republicans made to Medicaid and other health programs be reversed.
Eminently reasonable, but Republicans won’t budge. (Personally, I think Democrats should go further and refuse to fund any of the big ugly’s cuts to environmental protection, its additional tens of billions of dollars for ICE, and giant tax cuts for the rich.)
So, what now? How long will the shutdown last, and why?...
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