As of midnight our federal government is closed for business. After failing to pass a Continuing Resolution (CR), which would continue funding for federal programs, a defeated and fractured Congress decided to call it a night leaving 800,000 workers without a pay check, national parks, monuments, and zoos closed to the public, and WIC and Head Start recipients left in limbo.

So how did this all happen?

The House of Representatives and Senate have been divided for days on what the CR should contain and bills have been ping-ponging across the two houses with no agreement reached. The majority of the Senate supported a “clean” CR, which just kept funding going for a few months, at which time a larger budget deal could be worked out. Conservatives in the House, joined by Senator Ted Cruz, on the other hand, kept on insisting on attaching language that would defund or delay the Affordable Care Act. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said anything having to do with Obamacare would be a non-starter, therefore an agreement was unable to be reached and the government ran out of money at midnight. Despite the House Leadership’s best efforts, Obamacare remains the law of the land and millions of uninsured Americans can gain access to health insurance starting today!

While hundreds of thousands of government employees are furloughed, members of Congress can still report to work and they are expected to try to reach an agreement again today.

The shutdown will continue until Congress passes some sort of funding bill.

The real world consequences of a shutdown are stark. Here are just a few of the effects the shutdown will have on everyday Americans:

• The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) will cease issuing payments as of today. WIC helps 9 million mothers, infants and children with healthy-food vouchers, nutrition education, and breastfeeding support.  Some states might be able to move a few funds around in order to serve the pregnant mothers, new born infants, and toddlers in their programs, but because of the sequester’s across-the-board cuts, those reserve funds are mostly used up. If the shutdown persists, millions of at-risk mothers, infants and children could lose food assistance.

• Head Start  programs will be affected by the shutdown. Immediately, 20 programs around the country will close their doors to teachers and low-income children. This is on top of the 57,000 children who were turned away from Head Start in September due to the sequester cuts. If the shutdown persists, more of the 1,600 programs nationally could be affected.

• National parks, monuments, and zoos are closed during the shutdown. This will affect anyone planning a vacation or class trip during this time. Also if you were planning on traveling overseas anytime soon, your visa and passport will likely be very delayed because of the shutdown. And while tourists cannot visit the National Zoo, the animals (yes including the baby panda) will continue to be fed and cared for.

• The Center for Disease Control (CDC) is seeing massive reduction in workers due to the shutdown. These furloughs mean that monitoring of disease outbreaks will be delayed or reduced….just in time for flu season.

The Washington Post has a full list of what services will be available during the shutdown and which will be closed.

Despite the dysfunction, Congress was able to pass one bill last night, which President Obama signed into law. This bill will guarantee that members of the military get paid during the shutdown. Normally, members of the military still need to work during a shutdown, but receive an IOU from the government and their family goes with out a paycheck.  Because of the bill that was passed last night, active military members will continue to get paid no matter how long the shutdown carries on.

MomsRising will continue to keep you updated on the government shutdown and other budget issues in the days and weeks ahead.

In the meantime, it is important that we let Congress know how critical these programs are. We want to hear from you about what you think the priorities of Congress should be when it comes to the budget? What should they be funding? How do these programs help your family? Sharing the voices of moms and dads across the country is a powerful tool in this budgetary fight.