How we got to a government shutdown

If you’re as confused as we were about how exactly the government shutdown occurred, below is a simplified version of the key events in the House and Senate.

We’ve provided hyperlinks to the roll call votes that were taken at each step just in case you want to share your views on the shutdown with your representatives in (or any other members of) Congress.

• On September 20, the House passed a continuing resolution (H. J. 59) that would have kept the federal government running at current (postsequestration) funding levels until December 15. The continuing resolution, or CR, included a provision defunding the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as Obamacare. The vote in the House was 230–189, largely along party lines. (If all members had voted, a strict party-line vote in the Republican-dominated House would have been 232—200.)
• On September 27, the Senate voted to amend the CR by changing the expiration date to November 15 and by removing the provision defunding the ACA. The vote to pass a “clean CR” was 54–44, strictly along party lines (with the two Independents voting with the majority Democrats and two Republicans not voting).
• Just after midnight on September 29, the House voted to amend the Senate’s clean CR by moving the expiration date back to December 15 and by adding two new provisions, one delaying the ACA for one year and the other repealing the medical device excise tax in the ACA. There were two separate votes in the House passing this amended CR, 248–174 and 231–192.
• At 2:03 p.m. on September 30, the Senate voted to table the House-amended CR. As the Senate Web site explains, “A senator may move to table any pending question. The motion is not debatable, and agreement to the motion is equivalent to defeating the question tabled. The motion is used to dispose quickly of questions the Senate does not wish to consider further.” The vote passing the tabling motion in the Senate was 54–46.
• At 8:40 p.m. on September 30, the House voted a second time to amend the Senate’s clean CR by once again moving the expiration date back to December 15 and by adding two new provisions, one delaying for one year the individual mandate in the ACA and a second eliminating the employer subsidy for the health insurance plans of members of Congress, their staffs, the president and vice president, and political appointees at the White House. The vote in the House passing this version of the amended CR was 228–201.
• At 9:06 p.m. on September 30, the Senate voted once again to table the House-amended CR. The vote passing the tabling motion was 54–46.
• At 1:10 a.m. on October 1, the House passed a resolution (H. Res. 368) insisting on its latest amendment to the CR and requesting a conference with the Senate. The vote was 228–199.
• Sometime after 9:30 a.m. on October 1, the Senate voted to table the House request for a conference on the amended CR. The vote passing the tabling motion was 54–46 (although there is no permanent link available to the roll call vote yet).

So here we are at a stalemate: The Senate is insisting that the House pass a “clean CR,” with no strings attached, and the House so far has refused to allow a “clean CR” to be put to a vote.