Northeast Georgians react to latest government shutdown
The federal government is back open for business. President Donald Trump signed a bill late Monday that will fund the government through February 8. The three-week extension comes on the heels of a three-day stalemate over immigration reform.
The House of Representatives voted Monday evening on a Senate bill to end the shutdown. The measure passed the Senate by an 81-18. It passed the House of Representatives 266-150.
Between 700,000 and 800,000 federal employees were furloughed during the standoff, according to the Office of Management and Budget.
The deal was reached Monday afternoon after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell pledged that it was Republicans’ “intention to take up legislation here in the Senate that would address DACA, border security and related issues, as well as disaster relief,” according to ABC News.
Democrats had attempted to tie protection for Dreamers — some 800,000 undocumented immigrants brought to the U.S. illegally as children — to the funding bill. They had been covered by the Deferred Action on Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, started under President Obama but ordered ended by President Trump.
Several Democrats and GOP members changed their votes after McConnell backed away from his previous hard-line stance that President Trump would first have to sign off on an immigration bill before it moves to the floor.
“For the first time, we have the majority leader move off of we can only move something if the President agrees,” Rep. Jeff Flake (R-AZ) told reporters.
Reaction
This week marks the nineteenth federal government shutdown since the modern congressional budgeting process took effect in 1976. It’s the second shutdown in four years. The last time the government closed its doors for business was when Congress failed to pass a spending bill in Oct. 2013 due to a standoff over funding of the Affordable Care Act.
Just as it did then, this latest government shutdown sparked harsh public criticism of elected officials on both sides of the aisle. Now Habersham asked readers, “What’s your reaction to the government shutdown?” Here’s what some of them had to say:
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