A Look at the 19th Government Shutdown

                This past week, the 19^th government shutdown in the history of United States happened. This time the shutdown happened with a unified government in control. Members of Congress Nancy Pelosi took to twitter to recognize that “This is the first time in recent memory that a government shutdown has been possible when one party – one party- has controlled the White House, House, and Senate. The Republicans own that. #DoYourJob”. This means that one party controls both the legislature and the executive therefore a government shutdown should be somewhat avoidable. However, with a fractured Republican Party, the dependence of Democrats support makes it essential to vote on a budget to keep the government open. The politics in Washington have however become more polarized than ever before such that rather than attempting to come up with a political consensus, there is competition between the two parties two prove the incompetency and express distrust for the other side. The problem with this is that federal employees miss days and weeks of work. State governments experience great losses of the income from these shutdowns considering that some of these facilities are a major source of income for the states they are located.

The big difference in this shutdown is that the national mall and other Smithsonian facilities get to stay open. Previous shutdowns, the Smithsonian and other national parks lost billions during the shutdown. This year, the Smithsonian sent out a tweet noting that the museums and national mall in Washington DC and New York get to stay open. Every time a government shutdown looms, the question of what stays open and for how long. The procedure to determine what stays open has often depended on urgency where only key bodies stay open. In previous government shutdowns, the museum and national parks lost billions and stayed closed until the government reopened. I feel that this year’s efforts to keep the museums open was a strategic move to avoid significant losses. Considering that the shutdown did not go beyond Monday 22^nd 2018, we do not know what moves the Smithsonian Institutions would have to either stay open or keep the facilities functional.

The Smithsonian facilities stayed open with surplus funds from previous year and the facilities in New York, the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island in particular, stayed open because the State of New York decided to pay for the site as long as the government shutdown continues. The effects of the federal government shutdown on state government tends to be significant.

The State of New York and Washington DC receive visitors from all over the United States and all over the world every year. With a split Republican Party in the majority and the Democratic party pursuing a bill that would help them as the minority, the legislative branch does seem to care less about the functioning of the museums and attractions. For the members from the State of New York, allocating funds to keep the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island open may be a strategic maneuver to secure reelection which is the proximate goal for Members of Congress.

Arguments may be made that the efforts by the Democrats to ensure that DACA and CHIP stay on Congress’ agenda is reason enough to let the government shutdown. To some members of congress, the pursuit for DACA and CHIP are genuine, but the truth is the shutdown causes an immediate damage to the economy, to state governments, and to the people of the United States. The present political climate is defined by party lines. Both the red and the blue are darker than ever before. Passing bipartisan bills is harder than ever before and the efforts to blame one group or another seem more rational than working toward similar end goals.

So what does the effort to keep the Smithsonian museum, the Statue of Liberty, and Ellis Island open tell about the Federal Government? Government shutdowns have become common and even when they do not happen the probability of one happening every year seem to be growing higher. Institutions that depend on Federal funding will need to keep functioning even when the government shuts down to keep their profits going. These institutions realize that the shutdown and reopening of the government in a polarized country disadvantaged them since they fall under the not key institutions that rely on federal funding. For institutions like the post office, they are federally funded but do not rely on the federal government for their functioning. Maybe a majority of institutions will find grants that are not dependent on the federal government to keep functioning during shutdowns.