No Shutdown This Fall. Now Congress Has Until Dec. 11 to Do Its Real Job
A bipartisan stopgap kept the government open on Oct. 1 and avoided a repeat of last year's 43-day shutdown. In our view, that deserves credit, but none of the 12 regular spending bills has been enacted, and the clock is running.
By Clara Hughes
ALTAS WORLD NEWS OPINION | By Clara Hughes, Senior Features Writer | October 5, 2026 | 5-min read Last fall, the federal government shut down for 43 days, from Oct. 1 into mid-November [2]. That was longer than the 2018 shutdown, which Fox News says ran "a then-record 35 days" [2]. This October, the lights stayed on. That did not happen by accident. Republicans and Democrats did something rare: they worked together early and passed a stopgap budget weeks before the deadline. In our view, that deserves credit. But the stopgap ends on Dec. 11, and Washington has not yet done the harder work. Key Takeaways A bipartisan stopgap funds the government from Oct. 1 through Dec. 11, a 72-day period. If nothing new is enacted, a funding gap begins Dec. 12 [1]. It passed the Senate 90–6 and the House 370–48, and President Trump signed it on Sept. 2 [1]. None of the 12 regular spending bills for fiscal 2027 has been enacted. When the stopgap was enacted in early September, CRS reports, the House had passed 3 and the Senate Appropriations Committee had not reported any [1]. A stopgap, which Congress calls a continuing resolution or CR, keeps agencies running at roughly last year's levels. It is a bridge, not a budget. The question for the next 10 weeks is whether Congress builds the rest of the road or gets ready for another fall-season crisis. How We Got Here The law is H.R. 6500, the Continuing Appropriations and Extensions Act, 2027, now Public Law 119-103 [1]. The Congressional Research Service says it funds all 12 areas of government "from October 1, 2026, through December 11, 2026—a 72-day period covering roughly the first 10 weeks of FY2027" [1]. The Congressional Budget Office projects the stopgap provides "a total annualized amount of $1.701 trillion in discretionary budget authority" [1]. The road to it was not simple. In July, the House passed its own stopgap, H.R. 9770, running through Dec. 4, by a vote of 220–205 [1]. The Senate took up a bipartisan alternative inst…