The US government shut down at midnight on October 1 after Congress failed to approve new spending bills, forcing federal agencies nationwide to halt or scale back operations. At the heart of the shutdown is a standoff between Republican and Democratic Party politicians over healthcare. Over the summer, Republican lawmakers passed Donald Trump’s sweeping “Big Beautiful Bill” that makes deep cuts to public healthcare.

Democrats argue that the Republican budget plan would weaken programs like Medicaid, the nation’s largest public health insurance program which covers over 70 million people. Democratic Party lawmakers demanded that protections for these programs be locked into a short-term spending bill, and when Republicans failed to deliver, lawmakers were unable to pass a funding bill to avoid a shutdown. 

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