Shut up or shutdown

“After 43 days, the latest (longest-ever) government shutdown ended on Nov. 12 with a funding measure that provides full-year Agriculture, Military Construction and Veterans Affairs, and Legislative Branch appropriations, and continuing funding through Jan. 30 for other agencies. The Senate approved this amended version of the House-passed CR (continuing resolution) on Nov. 10 by a vote of 60 to 40. The House then passed the bill on Nov. 12 by a vote of 222 to 209. President Trump signed the measure the same day,” the Committee for a Responsible Budget (CFRB), a nonpartisan, non-profit US organization committed to educating the public on issues with significant fiscal policy impact, announced.

What was this 43-day government shutdown all about? The CFRB ought to know. It was all about the approval of the US appropriations budget for fiscal year October 2025 to Sept. 30, 2026.

By the CFRB’s own telling, “On Sept. 30, the Senate voted on whether to end debate on the House-passed continuing resolution (CR) that would extend government funding through Nov. 21. The Senate previously failed to end debate on that CR, as well as the alternative CR put forward by Democrats that would cost $1.5 trillion. The federal government shut down at midnight on Oct. 1.”

The discretionary spending caps that were put in place by the Fiscal Responsibility Act (FRA) are no longer binding for FY 2026. The Budget Committees of the House and the Senate debated a new resolution for FY 2026, where a new topline level for discretionary spending was proposed. From the Appropriations Committees, the funding bills moved to the House and Senate floor for approval before the final signing into law by the President.

The Republican-controlled House on day 43 of the shutdown — approved a new funding bill with a vote of 222 to 209. Six Democrats joined Republicans to vote “yes.” The package passed the Senate two days earlier by a vote of 60-40, after seven Democrats and one independent senator sided with Republicans to approve it, BBC News reported.

The 328-page bill extends money for most federal agencies until Jan. 30. It provides funding for Snap food aid, as well as the Department of Agriculture, Congress, and veterans affairs until September next year. It guarantees that all federal workers will receive back-pay, and reverses the shutdown-related layoffs of thousands of federal workers.

News commentaries emphasized this: The bill does not explicitly include what Democrats most wanted in this shutdown fight: a guaranteed extension of expiring health insurance subsidies that affect around 24 million Americans. Instead of including the extension in the continuing resolution bill itself, senators made a deal to hold another vote on the tax credits at the end of the second week in December.

CNN Politics confirms that the expiration of the beefed-up subsidies is indeed at the center of the battle on Capitol Hill to fund the federal government budget. The Democrats are demanding a short-term funding package which includes an extension of the enhanced assistance (otherwise the people’s health insurance premiums would more than double), while the Republicans are saying they won’t negotiate — both are intransigent.

On The Take, Aljazeera’s analyst Heidi Zhou Castro directly tied up the standstill with “the additional $1 trillion in spending to extend current healthcare subsidies” proposed by the Democrats versus the Republicans’ cost-cutting and streamlining of government under US President Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill.” Trump was shown to have said that “he can fire federal workers (who are illegal aliens, or who are redundant in the work force) during the shutdown, and this can be irreversible, the (labor) cuts made permanent even after the shutdown.”

Must federal employees suffer the uncertainty of pay every year, as shutdown threatens when legislators cannot agree on appropriations? Some 750,000 federal employees were “furloughed” — forced not to work during the 43-day shutdown — no paycheck, Castro said. “While most federal employees are not paid during a shutdown, members of Congress do continue to receive their salary,” a BBC news item taunted. Overall, analysts had estimated that this shutdown would knock roughly 0.1 to 0.2 percentage points off economic growth for each week that it goes on — about $15 billion a week.

President Trump slammed Democrats as “crazed lunatics” who have “lost their way,” blaming them for the government shutdown, the longest in history (CBS News, Nov. 3). The Republicans always voted to end it. The Democrats have been asking for an extension (now until December), always saying, ‘Give us an extension, we’ll work it out’,” Trump said. He seems to threaten, “Shut up or shutdown!”

Indeed, there are draconian laws on government appropriations and disbursement of funds, proceeding from Article I, Section 9, Clause 7 of the US Constitution:

“No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law; and a regular Statement and Account of the Receipts and Expenditures of all public Money shall be published from time to time.”

To implement the constitutional mandate: “The Anti-Deficiency Act (ADA) is Congress’s principal enforcement mechanism for its constitutional ‘power of the purse.’ It bars federal officials from obligating or expending funds in excess of, or in advance of, appropriations; prohibits acceptance of voluntary services (with narrow emergency exceptions); prohibits obligations in excess of Office of Management and Budget (OMB) apportionments; and requires agencies to report violations to the President and Congress. In modern shutdowns, these prohibitions are the legal force that halts non-excepted activities unless and until Congress enacts appropriations or a continuing resolution (taxproject.org/, Oct. 7).”

And to see to the compliance with the Anti-Deficiency Act, the US General Accounting Office (GAO) “issues legal opinions and decisions to Congress and federal agencies on the use of, and accountability for, public funds, including ruling on potential violations of the Anti-Deficiency Act. This includes appropriations law opinions and decisions, as well as GAO’s Red Book — Principles of Federal Appropriations Law — bids and awards, Anti-Deficiency Law, shutdowns], other information and updates (gao.gov.).”

With the tight-watching, close-guarding of government funds in the budget, one would imagine that corruption or abuse of power by government officials would be less. Of course, “no one is without sin,” as intuitive morality would discern. Research points out that “pork barrel politics,” the “practice of politicians trading favors with constituents or special interest groups in exchange for political support” was from earmarking of funds from the budget, or “riders” in contracts with government (according to Investopedia).

Still, as of November, the United States scores 65 on a scale from 0 (“highly corrupt”) to 100 (“very clean”) according to Transparency International’s 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index. When ranked by score, the United States ranks 28^th among the 180 countries in the index, where the country ranked first (Denmark) is perceived to have the most honest public sector.

Perhaps the Republicans hotly watching the Democrats and vice-versa has much to do in keeping the government honest. Pity the American people for being the shutdown victims in this clash of the titans, but they would be more pitiful if their money is diverted and stolen and their future lost to the greed of their very leaders and guardians.

According to the Philippine Institute for Development Studies (PIDS) and various watchdogs, the Philippines loses at least P700 billion to P1.4 trillion annually to corruption across all levels of government — from procurement and ghost projects to bribery, smuggling, and political patronage. Over the last decade, that translates to trillions siphoned off, enough to build thousands of schools, hospitals, and flood control systems the nation still lacks. The systemic corruption is done though insertions, diversions and “special funding” in the national budget.

President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. earlier revealed that only P100 billion of the entire P545-billion budget for flood mitigation projects from July 2022 to May 2025 was awarded to 15 out of 2,409 accredited contractors. In September, Finance Secretary Ralph Recto said that anomalous ghost flood control projects were estimated to have cost the Philippine economy as much as P118 billion ($2.4 billion) between 2023 and 2025.

Transparency International’s 2024 Corruption Perceptions Index ranks the Philippines 114^th out of 180 countries, with a score of 33 out of 100 — placing it among the most corrupt nations in Asia. “It’s a damning reflection of how deep the rot runs in the bureaucracy and the political class,” the PIDS said.

The Filipino people are the pitiful victims in this grand corruption by the very leaders and guardians they have chosen. But perhaps our fault is being indifferent, and allowing it all to happen and continue all these years that politicians and public servants have blatantly stolen from our coffers, without being made to answer for their greed.

We cannot shut up and shut down our future.

Amelia H. C. Ylagan is a doctor of Business Administration from the University of the Philippines.

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