Important Facts About The Government Shutdown for Perspective

1. The overwhelming majority of Americans say Democrats should NOT shut down the government, according to brand new polling from The New York Times, per the White House.

At midnight on October 1, 2025, the United States government “shutdown.”  What does a government shut down actually mean?  According to the Brookings Institute and USAFacts, a government shut down  occurs when Congress fails to pass funding legislation, leading to the temporary closure or reduction of non-essential government services and the furlough of non-essential federal employees. Essential services, such as law enforcement and air traffic control, continue to operate, but employees may not be paid until the shutdown ends.  

What triggered the shutdown?

According to the Brookings Institute,

“Congress failed to fund the government before the fiscal year ended on September 30, triggering the first government shutdown since 2019. The House of Representatives has approved a continuing resolution that would fund the government through November 21. In the Senate, it takes 60 votes to approve a temporary spending bill—currently, Republicans hold 53 seats—and Democrats say they won’t support such a bill unless Republicans agree, among other things, to extend expiring subsidies for Affordable Care Act premiums.”

Why do government shutdowns occur at all?

Governments shut down when the governing body (Democrats and Republicans) fail to agree on where and how money should be spent.

Think of your family as the nation.   You and your spouse are the Congress.  You are the Democrat and your spouse is the Republican.  Think of your monthly paycheck sitting in your bank account as the money that will fund your family government.  Your monthly bills are the government expenditures you must appropriate (i.e., commit to pay for a specific purpose).

You have 12 essential bills that must be paid every month to keep your household (the nation) running smoothly.  However, your spouse has been over spending by inviting strangers over every month and allocating the family’s grocery, healthcare, and education money to them while neglecting the core family needs.  Also, your spouse has a separate account you know nothing about that they are secretly stashing family expenditure money into for themselves.

You’ve tolerated them doing this for decades so as to not appear cruel and to keep the peace between you two.  But the spending is now out of control and unsustainable–worsening the recurring fiscal crisis (deficit) in the family every time they violate the family budgeting rules. You are now facing bankruptcy and foreclosure as a result.

This scenario is what’s happening in our government today as Republicans claim the Democrats are the irresponsible spouse wanting to put money back into the budget to give to non-citizens and nonessential nonprofits to fund strange foreign projects. Foreign  projects that DOGE identified, earlier this year, as waste, fraud, or abuse,  referring some of them to the Department of Justice for investigation. The Democrats claim the Republicans are heartless, racist, greedy capitalists whose budget priorities only protect the rich, fleece the poor, and deport good people who came here illegally.

The White House characterizes the shut down in this way:

“… Democrats insist on shutting down the government over their $1.5 trillion demand to give taxpayer-funded benefits to illegal aliens, subsidize woke “public” media, and gut funding for rural hospitals — jeopardizing critical funding for veterans, seniors, law enforcement, women and children in need, and many others.”

Democrat leaders characterize the shut down this way:

The Speaker of the House had this to say about the shut down and the 13 times they voted and attempted to pass a clean continuing resolution (CR) with the Democrats:

So whose fault is it, really?

Answer: Everybody’s.

That is both Democrats and Republicans. Democrats for stubbornly holding the line to prove a political point to their base–that they are good defenders against all things Donald Trump. And Republicans for going along to get along with radicalized Democrats and their incremental rollout of socialist policies (i.e.,Obamacare and generational welfare) over the past six decades. Republicans repeatedly failed their voter base by not prioritizing reforming the budgeting process to forever neutralize the option of government shut downs as a tool of political leverage (by any party).  Republicans had control of all branches of government in previous years (e.g., 2003-2007, 2017-2019) and did nothing impactful to advance longterm budget reform.

And it is also the fault of, we, voters who neglect to do the necessary research to know the long term impact of the policies and ideologies of the candidates we endorse. 

To help voters identify misinformation and fear-rage bait, iResearch offers a few facts and insights voters should know to put this shut down in proper perspective:

1. Republicans have had a CR ready to fund the government prior to the shutdown but the Democrats keep rejecting it.
2. 65% of Americans believe the Democrats should NOT keep holding the line on the shutdown.
3. This is a battle between two political worldviews that have been raging since the early 1900s.  Conservatism and Marxism (aka Socialism).  Consequently, voters should know that socialism is communism in slow motion.
4. Today, the battle is said to be between common sense conservatism represented by MAGA Republicans and radical Marxism now embraced by the Democrat Party.
5. The Affordable Care Act Tax Credit (Obamacare) and SNAP benefits trace all of their roots back to the Democrats and Civil Rights Era welfare programs.  Programs that created an unhealthy social dependency on  government subsidies–in exchange for votes.
6. This shutdown reveals why it’s a mistake for healthy people to be dependent, long term, upon their government for income, healthcare, and food.
7. Government subsidies to its citizens should be reserved for disabled, elderly, veterans, and temporary relief for able bodied American citizens (including married families not just single mothers) who have fallen on hard times until they are able to get back on their feet.

If we as a society can agree to teach and commit to the mindset that embraces the principles in numbers 6 and 7 above, then no political party will be incentivized to over promise government interventions in exchange for votes.

Then we can eliminate government shutdowns and get back to the simple form of government the Founders intended–where local and state government activities are primary voter focus,  not the federal government.