On December 21st, 2018, the government was unable to reach an agreement on the next funding bill due to President Trump’s demand for $5.7 billion in funding for a wall on the southern border of the U.S. This caused the government to partially shutdown on December 22nd, 2018.

On January 12th, 2019 the shutdown surpassed former U.S. President Bill Clinton’s record of 21 days for longest government shutdown in U.S. history.

This however is not a feat to be celebrated; the shutdown has caused countless problems for U.S. citizens.

Roughly 800,000 and counting government workers won’t be receiving a paycheck during the shutdown. One federal worker, Mallory Lorge, is being forced to sell her possessions and ration what little insulin she has in order to afford paying her bills.

“I can’t afford to go to the ER. I can’t afford anything. I just went to bed and hoped I’d wake up,” Mallory Lorge commented on her current situation.

In addition to this, there has been a halt to the funding of many government programs. These programs include the Department of Housing and Urban Development which puts many people who are currently receiving housing assistance at risk for eviction. The National Parks Service has ceased road maintenance, and the Food and Drug Administration who has stopped processing drug applications and routine checks.

During an interview at the White House on January 4th, President Trump claimed “the shutdown could go on for months or even a year or longer” until he gets funding for his wall.

The increased length of the shutdown could prove to be catastrophic for the United States and its citizens and could possibly result in an economic recession.

In fact, an analysis by Standard & Poor’s Global Ratings has shown that an unrecoverable $3.6 billion was lost by January 11th alone; if the shutdown continues, its estimated that by January 25th the U.S. would have lost $5.7 billion: the equivalent of what President Trump is demanding for the boarder wall. President Trump insists that implementing a wall would prevent criminals and terrorists from crossing the southwest boarder and wreaking havoc into the U.S..

But, according to data collected by the Department of Homeland Security, most stops of known or suspected terrorists have occurred mainly in ports of entry such as airports and no immigrant arrests have been made in the southwest border on charges of terrorism in the past few years.

This information is disturbing as airports are currently facing a shortage of security due to the lack of TSA agents since they rather take time off or look for an alternative source of income in order to feed their families and pay their bills.

Despite all these issues and many protests from U.S. citizens, President Trump revealed to Kelly O’Donnell on January 6th that he firmly believes federal workers are willing to sacrifice their pay for an increase in boarder security.

“…they’ll make adjustments. People understand exactly what’s going on. But many of those people that won’t be receiving a paycheck, many of those people agree 100 percent with what I’m doing.”

Sources
 https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/01/09/us/politics/longest-government-shutdown.html
https://www.thedailybeast.com/government-shutdown-forces-houston-airport-to-close-tsa-checkpoint (airport security)
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/01/08/us/politics/government-shutdown-calendar.html (list of affects)
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/fact-check-did-u-s-catch-4-000-terrorists-southern-n954796 (4000 fact check)
https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2019-01-11/shutdown-has-cost-us-economy-36-billion-so-far (3.7 billion dollars)
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/04/us/politics/democrats-trump-meeting-government-shutdown.html (Could last months)
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/424057-trump-i-can-relate-to-federal-workers-going-without-pay-during (agree 100 percent)
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/01/09/us/politics/longest-government-shutdown.html 
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/federal-worker-forced-ration-insulin-because-government-shutdown-n958066 (forced to ration insulin)