[WASHINGTON, DC] – For the fifth time in 30 years, Republicans have shut down the federal government.  As the nation braces for the Trump Shutdown, Congressman Ben Ray Luján (D-NM) called out President Trump and Congressional Republicans for failing to pursue bipartisan solutions to keep the government open and meet the needs of the American people.

“Republicans were so obsessed with handing tax breaks to corporations and the wealthiest that they ignored their basic responsibility to govern for the American people,” said Luján. “Republicans control the House, the Senate and the White House, but they couldn’t even act to pass children’s health, give our military the certainty they need to keep our nation safe, protect DREAMers or keep the government open.  Now, this incompetence threatens to hurt our economy and to hurt communities in New Mexico.”

Luján noted that in 2013, President Trump called Fox News to lay blame for the government shutdown at the feet of President Obama, saying, “the problems start from the top and have to get solved from the top… The President is the leader, and he’s got to get everybody in a room and he’s got to lead.” Now, when the mantle of leadership rests on his shoulders, President Trump sings a different tune. He explicitly called for a shutdown, tweeting last year that “our country needs a good shutdown.”

Luján pointed out that a government shutdown has stark consequences for the American people and New Mexico.  A report issued after the 2013 Republican government shutdown detailed many of the impacts of shutdown, showing that it:

• Halted or curtailed important services for New Mexico’s 172,717 veterans. Services that help veterans understand their benefits – including the education call center, hotlines, and all regional office outreach activities – were closed to the public during the shutdown, and many veterans lost access to vocational rehabilitation and education counseling services;
• Furloughed two-thirds of the doctors and scientists at the Centers for Disease Control and three-fourth of staff at the National Institutes of Health severely limiting flu season surveillance and monitoring;
• Closed New Mexico’s 15 National Parks, disrupting travel and tourism and hurting the surrounding local economies. In 2016, 1.9 million park visitors spent an estimated $108.4 million while visiting national parks in New Mexico, supporting 1,700 jobs;
• Delayed life-saving FDA food safety inspections, causing uncertainty in the nation’s food supply;
• Disrupted 1.2 million private-sector loans nationwide and delayed home loan decisions for hundreds of families in New Mexico. The Department of Agriculture’s single-family loan guarantee program was unable to process any loan applications during the shutdown, preventing many eligible families in rural areas from receiving loans;
• Impacted transition services for New Mexico military service members who were transitioning to civilian life. The shutdown also delayed access for 1,400 military service members to workshops designed to help them transition to civilian life and civilian employment:
• Delayed billions in tax refunds;
• Shuttered Head Start centers serving 6,300 children;
• Destroyed 120,000 private-sector jobs and furloughed federal government and contract workers such as those at national labs, including LANL and Sandia who could not continue their research or perform their jobs. This resulted in lost wages, lost productivity and disruptions across the board at such facilities.

“Congress still faces a huge list of urgent, overdue and overwhelmingly bipartisan business,” said Luján.  “There’s no need for a Trump Shutdown, we just need the Republicans who control Congress to show some leadership and work to find common ground to meet the needs of the American people.  Democrats will continue to do our jobs and push for real action for veterans, children, DREAMers, workers, seniors, communities ravaged by opioids, and families worried about how the Trump Shutdown impacts them.”

“Residents of northern New Mexico should know that I will do whatever I can to help local families and businesses navigate the Trump Shutdown,” Luján added.

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