Congress failed to pass an appropriations bill for the 2025-2026 fiscal year by the October 1st deadline, leading to a government shutdown beginning at 12:01 on Wednesday, October 1st, 2025. 

“The government shutdown is an inability for members of Congress to come to a majority consensus over how we should spend our money and how we should prioritize some policies,” said Ms. Kelly Guffey, the AP US Government and Politics teacher at Brophy. 

In order for the House of Representatives to pass an appropriations bill, a simple majority is needed, however, in the Senate a super-majority of 60 affirmative votes is needed. This is where the bill is getting held up, mainly due to a dispute over money allotted to healthcare programs. 

Non-essential federal employees are not allowed to work during a government shutdown, and essential workers who are forced to clock in aren’t paid until the shutdown is over. 

“If [a Brophy student] has family members who work for the federal government and work currently unpaid and not working, then that is an immediate economic concern,” Ms. Guffey said. 

Ms. Guffey suggested that students use the shutdown as an impetus to learn more about the important issues in our country. 

“The budget bill is really big. There’s lots of stuff in it. We’re a very large, expensive country. There are a couple of big prominent spending issues that tend to be gridlocked,” Ms. Guffey said. “So it’s really not just about the thousands of priorities, but there are three or four particularly large policy issues that people should check out and see where they fall and why it’s important.”