Government shutdown 2025 live: Congress fails to reach 11th hour deal on spending bill

President Donald Trump’s budget office has posted a letter, saying, “Affected agencies should now execute their plans for an orderly shutdown.”

Russ Vought, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, told federal employees to come to their next shift to “undertake orderly shutdown activities.”

Vought blamed the Democrats for the shutdown, writing that Democratic senators blocked the passage of a spending bill supported by Trump “due to Democrats’ insane policy demands.”

Senate Democrats held firm and chose to block a Republican spending bill Tuesday evening, all but guaranteeing a government shutdown — even as President Donald Trump threatened “irreversible” layoffs if the bureaucracy is ground to a halt.

The Republican-controlled Senate put forth a stopgap spending bill called a continuing resolution to keep the government open until Thanksgiving. But Democrats voted against the continuing resolution, also called a CR, with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer leading the charge to a shutdown.

Only Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.), Angus King (I-Maine) and John Fetterman (D-Penn). joined the Republicans. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) was the only Republican to oppose it.

The vote sets up a full-blown government shutdown, the third during Trump’s two presidencies and the first since 2018-2019, from 12:01 a.m. on Wednesday, October 1.

Read more from Eric Garcia:

Labor Secretary Lori Chavez-DeRemer has said Democrats are playing “political games” as a government shutdown looms.

“America First policies are working, and it’s going to come to a screeching halt because the Democrats are choosing to play political games,” Chavez-DeRemer told Fox Business Tuesday.

Democrats’ reluctance to pass a short-term spending bill to avoid a government shutdown is over healthcare concerns.

They have demanded a reversal of cuts to Medicaid, set out earlier this year in Trump’s “Big, Beautiful, Bill,” and an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies.

A Republican-led spending bill to stop the government from shutting down has failed in the Senate in a 55 to 45 vote.

Democrats John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, Catherine Cortez Masto of Nevada and Angus King of Maine voted with 52 Republicans in favor of the bill, while 44 Democrats and Republican Rand Paul of Kentucky voted against it.

The vote failed shortly after a spending bill pushed by the Democrats, which included reversing Medicaid cuts and extending Affordable Care Act subsidies, failed along party lines.

Lawmakers needed to pass a spending plan by midnight to avoid a government shutdown; now a shutdown is imminent.

A short-term spending bill pushed by Democrats has failed in the Senate in a 47 to 53 vote along party lines.

Widely shared video shows masked federal agents throwing several reporters to the floor inside an immigration courthouse in downtown Manhattan, days after an Immigration and Customs Enforcement officer was suspended for tackling a crying woman and pinning her to the ground in the same building.

Video from inside 26 Federal Plaza, which serves as headquarters for several federal law enforcement agencies, shows masked agents trying to forcibly remove a journalist from an elevator while calling out “get out the f****** elevator.”

Another agent then shoves a photographer across the hall. A third photographer is then knocked to the floor; footage from photojournalist Stephanie Keith shows him grabbing his head in pain before emergency medical personnel arrive and put him in a neck brace and on to a stretcher.

Last week, a crying woman pleading for her husband’s release from ICE custody was hospitalized after an agent shoved her across the hall, pushed her to the ground and pinned her down on her back.

Read more from Alex Woodward:

Senator Bernie Sanders, an independent from Vermont, has laid out what Republicans can do to get his support to stop a government shutdown at midnight.

Representative Seth Moulton, a Massachusetts Democrat, has justified Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer’s strategy during the looming government shutdown, saying, “He is fighting harder.”

“ He is using what little leverage that we have,” Moulton said of Schumer on CNN Tuesday. “Some might say, ‘Why aren’t we asking for even more?’ What we’re asking for is actually something that Republicans should want because it’s good for Red states too.

“It’s just lowering healthcare premiums, keeping them affordable for Americans, no matter what your political strife is.”

In March, Schumer supported a six-month spending bill to keep the government open, saying, “While the Republican bill is very bad, the potential for a shutdown has consequences for America that are much much worse.”

But now Democrats are digging their heels in, demanding an extension of Affordable Care Act subsidies in exchange for their vote to keep the government open.

“The Republicans have had 45 days over and over and over to come to us and talk about protecting your health care. They didn’t. They would rather shut the government down than protect your health care,” Schumer wrote on X Tuesday.

President Donald Trump told reporters Tuesday, “A lot of good can come down from [government] shutdowns.”

“We can get rid of a lot of things that we didn’t want. And they’d be Democrat things,” Trump said.