White House reportedly wants list of programs that would be most hurt by shutdown lasting into March

(Image credit: Alex Wong/Getty Images)

last updated 24 January 2019

White House acting Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney has asked agency leaders to send him a list, due no later than Friday, of the programs that would suffer most if the government shutdown continues into March or April, people with knowledge of the matter told The Washington Post on Wednesday.

This is the first known White House request for information about how the shutdown is affecting agencies, the Post notes, and it suggests the Trump administration doesn't expect it to end anytime soon. Because of the shutdown, now the longest in U.S. history, 800,000 government employees have missed a paycheck, and if things stay the way they are, they'll miss a second one in a few days.

The White House has mostly focused on how the shutdown is affecting wait times at airport security, not federal programs being interrupted, the Post reports. There's a lot to start worrying about: After Feb. 1, major operations within the federal court system will likely come to a standstill, and the Department of Agriculture does not have enough money to distribute food stamp benefits to about 40 million people in March. On Wednesday, the U.S. General Services Administration, which manages leases and contracts, told several departments that if the shutdown goes into February, there is no plan on how to pay utility bills and lease payments next month.

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Catherine Garcia has worked as a senior writer at The Week since 2014. Her writing and reporting have appeared in Entertainment Weekly, The New York Times, Wirecutter, NBC News and "The Book of Jezebel," among others. She's a graduate of the University of Redlands and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism.

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