Liz Mantush | staff writer

It is now week two of the United States federal government shutdown, which is the first since 2018. Professors and students are blaming the closure on both parties’ refusal to agree.

“It comes from a lack of compromise which is something both parties are victims of,” said Jonathan Collins, president of College Republicans at Duquesne.

On Sept. 30, the end of the fiscal year for the government, the Senate failed to pass the bill to approve funding for the coming year, resulting in areas of the government shutting down.

The shutdown results in a funding gap that temporarily closes or reduces non-essential government functions, according to USAFacts. Some federal employees are furloughed or temporarily laid off and essential employees continue to work without pay. Members of the Senate and Congress still are receiving their wages.

“It’s going to affect regular people,” said Riley Hunter, Duquesne student and president of a local chapter of College Democrats.

Republicans currently hold 53 seats in the Senate, making them the majority, but a vote of 60 is required to pass the U.S. government’s annual budget. Only three Democrats voted yes resulting in a 55 to 45 vote.

Alison Dagnes, professor and chair of political science at Shippensburg University, said the growing sentiment to stand up to the federal government by Democrats comes after the passing of President

Donald Trump’s “One Big Beautiful Bill” along with the reduction of funding from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and Medicaid.

“[They said] all right, we can’t play ball with you anymore, because you made promises that you did not keep, and furthermore, you lied to us,” Dagnes said. “They said we’re going to shut the government down.”

Included in the annual budget was a major cut for government subsidies going toward the Affordable Care Act (ACA), which provides 47 million people with healthcare in the U.S. At the end of the calendar year, premiums for those under the ACA will nearly double.

This is also an opportunity for minority Democrats to make a stand with the very little power they have, with Republicans controlling all three branches of the federal government, Dagnes said.

“They have a cause, but it’s a cause that is taking place in the context where they feel that the Trump administration is either overreaching or doing, from their perspective, wrong-headed policies,” said Mark Haas, professor of political science at Duquesne.

Haas said that government shutdowns do not happen every time a situation like this occurs because of the toll they take on both parties and their constituents.

“They’re not inevitable because they’re painful to both parties,” Haas said.

During this standstill, Haas said Trump is treating the shutdown as an opportunity to lay off about 750,000 federal employees, predominantly in blue states.

Dagnes said to reopen the government the Democrats either will cave and give the Republicans the votes they need or lawmakers negotiate a compromise on healthcare.

Hunter said she hopes there will be a compromise.

“Some things are going to have to give,” Hunter said.

Liz Mantush can be reached at mantushe@duq.edu