What we covered here
• No votes tonight: The Senate won’t vote on any government funding bills this evening. That means the shutdown will continue into tomorrow, when another round of votes on proposals to reopen the government are anticipated. Democrats and Republicans continue to be at odds over enhanced Obamacare subsidies.
• Shut down for nearly a week: President Donald Trump suggested that some federal workers don’t deserve back pay. The president also said he’ll soon announce which government programs he intends to permanently eliminate amid the shutdown.
• Travel woes: Travelers are starting to feel the impacts of the shutdown as US as air traffic controller staffing issues are leading to delays at airports in major cities, like Houston, Newark, Las Vegas, Nashville and the Boston area.
Our live coverage of the federal government shutdown has ended for the day. Get the latest here.
GOP congressman argues Americans don’t want furloughed workers to get paid
Republican Rep. Jim Jordan argued Tuesday that Americans do not support federal workers who have been furloughed amid the government shutdown receiving back pay.
“Most Americans say if you’re working, you should get paid. If you’re not, that’s a different question,” Jordan told CNN’s Kaitlan Collins.
Traditionally, all federal workers impacted by the shutdown receive back pay. But earlier Tuesday, President Donald Trump floated not giving back pay to all federal employees.
“I would say it depends on who we’re talking about,” Trump said from the Oval Office.
During the 2018-2019 government shutdown, Jordan voted in favor of furloughed workers receiving back pay. Pressed by Collins on why his position is different now, Jordan said, “It’s not different now.”
“It depends on what the president decides to do and then what, what we pick up as Congress,” Jordan added.
Top GOP leaders have distanced themselves from the idea and made clear earlier Tuesday they supported back pay for government workers.
As the government shutdown continues, thousands of federal workers have been forced to take unpaid leave, while many others — those deemed essential — are continuing to work without a paycheck.
Ground stop issued for Nashville-bound flights due to air traffic controller staffing shortages
The Federal Aviation Administration has issued a ground stop for flights heading to Nashville International Airport until at least 9 p.m. ET Tuesday night, due to staffing shortages.
Advisories like these are issued so air traffic controllers can limit the incoming number of flights so they can safely handle them with the resources they have.
The airport is also under a ground delay program until 1 a.m. ET, with flights destined for Nashville being held from taking off an average of more than two hours.
The part of the FAA facility which manages flights arriving or departing the airport closed for five hours Tuesday night, according to an FAA notice. Flights are still allowed, but pilots must contact the regional air traffic control center in Memphis to obtain clearance to enter the airspace.
The reason for the staff shortage was not immediately clear, but Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said Monday that an increased number of controllers have called out sick since the start of the shutdown.
Contributing to delays, Nashville also experienced strong thunderstorms Tuesday afternoon, with heavy rain, winds gusting up to 25 miles per hour and visibility of three miles.
There have been about 244 Nashville flights delayed today, according to the website FlightAware. That’s a little less than a quarter of the arrivals and departures.
House Democrats demand DOJ probe into partisan out-of-office emails sent without furloughed workers’ consent
House Democrats are demanding that the Department of Justice investigate the Trump administration for “commandeering the email accounts of thousands of nonpartisan, career civil servants without their consent” to send partisan out-of-office messages blaming Democrats for the government shutdown – a move they say violates the First Amendment.
“This is not only unlawfully compelled speech but potentially a federal criminal felony,” the lawmakers wrote in a letter obtained by CNN and addressed to the Justice Department’s acting attorney general for the criminal division.
The demand for a DOJ investigation follows a CNN report last week revealing that multiple furloughed employees at the Department of Education had out-of-office messages automatically sent from their email account. The messages, which blamed Senate Democrats for the government shutdown, were sent without the employees’ consent, sources with knowledge of the situation told CNN. Federal workers who attempted to revert their messages to neutral language found them changed back to the partisan version later.
In response to CNN’s questions about the practice, an Education Department spokesperson said, “The email reminds those who reach out to Department of Education employees that we cannot respond because Senate Democrats are refusing to vote for a clean CR and fund the government. Where’s the lie?”
CNN also reported that several other government agencies, including Health and Human Services and the Small Business Administration, instructed furloughed employees to use similar language blaming Senate Democrats for the shutdown in their automated messages.
CNN has reached out to the Justice Department and the Education Department for comment.
CNN’s Hannah Rabinowitz contributed.
Senate expected to vote on short-term funding proposals tomorrow
The Senate is expected to vote on competing Democratic and GOP stopgap proposals to reopen the government tomorrow.
It comes after lawmakers did not take any funding votes today as the shutdown heads into its seventh day.
Swing vote Senate Dems hold firm in shutdown standoff
Swing vote Senate Democrats showed no signs of backing away from their hardline stance of withholding votes from a bill to fund the government through late November, insisting that public opinion is on their side even as the shutdown stretches into a second week.
“Nobody likes a shutdown,” Sen. Tim Kaine acknowledged to CNN, though he implied that he does not believe that the Trump administration’s threats of federal firings and refusing back pay for furloughed workers will be enough to pressure Democrats to cave.
The Virginia Democrat, who represents a large population of federal employees, said Office of Management and Budget Director Russ Vought has “tried to traumatize” the federal workforce already and his new warnings are an “empty threat” because “they view him as doing that anyway.”
Sen. Gary Peters, who declined to block a GOP-led government funding bill in March, told Raju, “no,” he’s not backing away from his decision this time to vote with the majority of his party against the stopgap bill.
“Health care is still an issue, that hasn’t gone away,” he explained, noting that people will see “very large increases in their premiums” once enrollment begins next month.
The Michigan Democrat said his constituents have not been urging him to back away from his position and reopen the government.
The Senate isn't scheduled to vote on any funding bills today, but it did confirm 107 nominees in a single vote
The Senate confirmed 107 nominees on Tuesday in a single vote, after Republicans changed Senate rules last month to allow for en bloc consideration of lower-level nominees.
The vote was 51-47 on party lines.
The nominees confirmed include Herschel Walker to be Ambassador to the Bahamas. Walker ran for Senate in Georgia in 2022 against Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock.
This comes as the Senate does not have votes scheduled this evening on any bills to reopen the government, making it likely the shutdown will extend into Wednesday.
White House says it will use tariff revenue to fund federal food aid for mothers and young children
The Trump administration said Tuesday it will use tariff funds to keep afloat a federal food assistance program for nearly 7 million pregnant women, new moms and young children during the government shutdown.
The program, known as WIC, was expected to run out of money soon because Congress has yet to approve a federal spending package for fiscal year 2026, which started on October 1. The National WIC Association has predicted that the program’s funding would last only a week or two into the shutdown.
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt announced the tariff idea in a post on X.
WIC, which has long had bipartisan support, has emerged as a talking point among Republicans on how the shutdown is hurting Americans. House Speaker Mike Johnson previously called his Democratic colleagues “shameful” and blamed them for how the government shutdown has impacted WIC.
Axios first reported the White House effort.
Some context: President Donald Trump has been adding and increasing tariffs on a wide swath of products and countries, which he argues will spur more manufacturing in the US and bolster national security. Tariff collections have totaled $190 billion so far this year. Section 232 tariffs are imposed on national security grounds.
The tariff money goes into a general fund managed by the Treasury Department. The Treasury refers to that account as “America’s checkbook,” because it’s used to pay some of the government’s pre-existing bills, such as distributing tax refunds.
But the general fund is essentially frozen until a bill is passed to fund the government. Congress and Trump could get around that by passing a measure designating the tariff revenue for a specific use. However, neither party appears keen on that.
CNN’s Elisabeth Buchwald contributed to this post.
Nashville air traffic control facility will close tonight due to short staffing
The air traffic control facility responsible for flights approaching and departing Nashville International Airport will close for five hours tonight due to short staffing.
This is the second time in two days that a Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) facility has closed due to staffing problems.
What does this mean: In Nashville, between 7 p.m. and midnight ET (6 p.m. and 11 p.m. local) flights will be allowed to continue flying, but pilots will have to contact the regional air traffic control center in Memphis to obtain clearance to enter the airspace.
The reason for the staff shortage was not immediately clear, but Secretary of Transportation Sean Duffy said yesterday that an increased number of controllers have called out sick since the start of the shutdown.
Contributing to delays, Nashville also experienced strong thunderstorms this afternoon, with heavy rain, winds gusting up to 25 miles per hour and visibility of three miles.
CNN’s Brandon Miller contributed to this report.
Schumer insists GOP "feeling the heat" from public pressure on health care issues
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer brushed off suggestions that Democrats may ultimately not be able to extract concessions from a prolonged shutdown standoff, insisting that his party was winning the political argument that Americans want to see enhanced Affordable Care Act subsidies extended.
He insisted the GOP is “feeling the heat,” quipping that Speaker Mike Johnson “couldn’t look straight in the camera” while talking about Republicans’ openness to address the issue once the government reopens and noting that President Donald Trump suggested on Monday he could get behind a health care deal.
Schumer denied that he’s bowing to political pressure — and a potential primary challenge — from the left wing of his party, telling reporters, “the bottom line is very simple. We’re fighting for the American people.”
The air traffic tower at Chicago's O'Hare is one of the FAA facilities facing staffing shortage
The Federal Aviation Administration expanded the list of air traffic control facilities experiencing staffing shortages today, including one of the busiest towers in the country.
Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport air traffic control tower will be short staffed from 3 p.m. to midnight ET, the FAA said in its operations plan.
Nashville International Airport’s tower will not have all of its controllers from 3:30 p.m. until 6 p.m. ET. The FAA ground delay program means flights from all US cities scheduled to arrive in Nashville between 5 p.m. and 1 a.m. ET will have to wait to take off from their origin airport. That means the shortage could cause delays averaging more than two hours at the airport tonight.
The towers are not expected to shut down, as happened yesterday at Hollywood Burbank airport in California, but without a full staff of controllers, delays are likely.
Other facilities with short staffing include the approach and departure facilities for Houston, Newark and Las Vegas and flights in the Boston area.
Houston’s two major airports, Hobby and Bush George Bush Intercontinental Airport are both expected to see ground delays because of the staffing shortage.
The FAA does not detail the reasons for the short staffing, but Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy noted Monday that an increased number of air traffic controllers have called out sick since the start of the shutdown.
This post has been updated with additional information about Nashville International Airport.
Speaker Johnson tells reporters back pay uncertainty should “turn up the pressure” on Democrats
Speaker Johnson told reporters after visiting Senate Republicans’ lunch that he believes furloughed workers are entitled to back pay, but there’s “some legal analysis that says that may not be the appropriate thing legally.”
“So we’ll see how that shakes out,” he said, noting he hadn’t read into the analysis.
The speaker argued the uncertainty surrounding back pay should “turn up the pressure on the Democrats to get serious” about reopening the government.
“I mean, when you’re withholding paychecks and there’s a prospect that they – back pay may not be allowed to furloughed federal workers, civilian workers who rely upon those paychecks, that means the political games just got that much more heated,” he said.
He went on, “There’s one way to make all this stop. Come in here tomorrow and vote to open the government. That would be their next opportunity. And I hope you’ll all ask them why they won’t do that.”
Speaker Johnson’s visit to the Senate Republicans’ lunch was a brief one. He told reporters that there was a “great spirit” in the room and that Republicans were completely united over the issue of government funding.
“I can tell you that the members in that room are just as resolved as the members are in the House that we are going to hold the line and do the right thing for the people. The Democrats have to come to their senses,” he said.
He said senators did not discuss doing away with the filibuster at lunch.
Union is discouraging air traffic controllers from calling out sick to protest shutdown
The Department of Transportation has seen an uptick in air traffic controllers calling out sick since the federal government shutdown almost a week ago, while the union representing them has disavowed any coordinated work actions.
Controllers, like Transportation Security Administration officers, are considered necessary employees and are working despite the government’s lapse in funding.
On October 14, air traffic controllers would be paid for any time worked before the shutdown started, and October 28 would be the first scheduled pay day controllers aren’t paid at all.
“There’s controllers that have called up sick, and we’re tracking it,” Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said yesterday.
The National Air Traffic Controllers Association — which represents nearly 20,000 controllers, engineers and other aviation professionals — called it “normal” for a few controllers to call in sick on any given day. The union has been discouraging controllers from calling out sick to protest the shutdown.
Still, controllers can call out if they are actually sick, but there are regulations.
Organized job actions like strikes or sickouts are prohibited by federal law, but since air traffic control staffing is so tight, a small number of employees taking unscheduled time off could be enough to cause problems.
The government shutdown is impacting FAA facilities across the country. Here's the latest
Yesterday, sick calls by air traffic controllers at the Hollywood Burbank airport control tower forced it to close in the late afternoon.
Flights still were able to take off and land but had to operate using rules typically used by smaller airports with no control tower. Delays stretched more than two hours.
Controllers are considered essential workers, so they must work during the shutdown, but are not being paid.
More Federal Aviation Administration facilities are reporting staffing shortages as the government shutdown continues. .
Here are the latest headlines:
Republican lawmaker questions legality of withholding back pay, as others slam Democrats
CNN caught up with some Republican senators to ask them their thoughts on the ongoing shutdown. Here’s what they told us:
Missouri GOP Sen. Josh Hawley said he didn’t know whether it was legal for the Trump administration to withhold back pay for federal workers, while other Republicans continued to blame Democrats for continuing the shutdown in the first place.
Hawley pointed out the many Americans who will be impacted by a prolonged shutdown, including veterans who can’t receive full Veterans Affairs benefits, people who can’t enroll in Medicare and military service members who won’t be paid.
Fellow Missouri GOP Sen. Eric Schmitt claimed he hadn’t seen the back pay memo reporting, but reiterated that reopening the government is key to further negotiations with Democrats, saying once that happens, “we can have lots of policy discussions.”
In the meantime, South Dakota Republican Sen. Mike Rounds said it’s up to the president to make decisions about how to run the federal government, especially as Congress remains at a stalemate over funding.
Trump casts shutdown-related airport issues as "Democrat delays"
President Donald Trump responded for the first time Tuesday to the government shutdown’s impact on American airports, framing any issues people are experiencing as “Democrat delays.”
The shutdown has led to air traffic controller staffing issues, prompting delays at major airports and forcing pilots in some areas to pivot to alternative workflows. Controllers are considered essential workers, so they must work during the shutdown, but are not being paid. And the number of controllers calling out sick has increased since the start of the shutdown, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy has said.
Asked by CNN’s Paula Newton whether he was concerned about those delays, the president offered his own branding.
“Oh, sure — I mean — they’re all Democrat delays. There are delays at the airport. That’s standard,” Trump said during an Oval Office meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney.
A longtime businessman and marketer, Trump has long turned to bite-size, memorable taglines — from “Make America Great Again” to “Sleepy Joe” to “TrumpRx” — to drive a narrative, this time turning to the tactic to place blame for real impacts from the government shutdown.
GOP senator says there's no off-ramp to end the shutdown this week
Republican Sen. Thom Tillis told CNN Tuesday that “no,” he doesn’t see a viable off-ramp to end the shutdown this week.
And not guaranteeing back pay for furloughed federal employees, he warned, would be a “strategic mistake.”
Tillis pushed for Democrats to vote for the GOP-backed stopgap funding bill to reopen the government, and punt on health care negotiations for later in the year.
“I know there’s a lot of hard-working people that are at home right now or not working because the Democrats refuse to continue the current spending levels. That’s all we ask that they do,” he said.
Trump compares Democrats to "insurrectionists"
President Donald Trump on Tuesday compared Democrats to “insurrectionists” when describing the passage of his “big, beautiful bill” over the summer.
Trump often points out how not a single Democrat voted for his bill.
“Everybody said, ‘It’s not doable,’ because it’s the biggest bill ever passed in the history of our country, and we got it all done,” Trump continued.
Some context: The president has frequently attached the “insurrection” label to things and people he opposes, including Antifa, his baseless claims of a “stolen” 2020 election, and former President Joe Biden.
Trump says he'll unveil permanent cuts to government programs soon
President Donald Trump said Tuesday he’ll announce soon which government programs he intends to permanently eliminate amid the ongoing shutdown.
“We have a lot,” he said in the Oval Office. “I’m not going to tell you, but we’ll be announcing it pretty soon. But we have a lot of things that we’re going to eliminate and permanently eliminate.”
The White House has warned that thousands of federal workers could be permanently laid off as a result of the lapse in funding, and has already paused federal funding for projects in mostly blue states.
Trump said the shutdown provided him an “advantage” in pursuing his goals of slimming down the federal bureaucracy.
Pointing to his budget director, Russell Vought, Trump said work was underway to prepare for the cuts.
“He’s a serious person, very serious person. And he’s sitting there and he’s getting ready to cut things,” Trump said. “And this is something that was handed to us by, I assume, (Senate Democratic leader Chuck) Schumer.”
Senate Democrats warn of legal costs if Trump admin refuses to back pay furloughed workers
Senate Democrats warned the Trump administration not to withhold back pay for federal workers furloughed during the shutdown, but did not show signs of wavering in their commitment to using the stalled funding issue to force Republicans to the table on health care issues.
Sen. Tim Kaine, who was instrumental in passing the 2019 legislation that guaranteed back pay to furloughed workers, pointed out the irony of the draft White House memo, since Trump was the one to sign it into law.
“The president’s team is suggesting that he break his own word and punish people. I mean, I hope they’ll remember that this was a bill that he signed, and he should implement it,” he said.
Sen. Richard Blumenthal argued the White House is “potentially defying the law” and that all senators should have “basic agreement” that federal workers are entitled to pay.
The Connecticut Democrat predicted that “ultimately, the costs will be higher” for the administration if they carry out mass firings and withhold pay from furloughed workers due to steep legal fees when the actions are challenged in court.
“The cost will be greater than any kind of boasted savings. Defying the law ultimately is pretty costly, because people are entitled to not only back pay, but potentially to damages,” he said.
