The United States is only a few hours away from a paralysis of the federal administration, in the absence of a vote on its financing, a scandal in which President Joe Biden and the Republicans assign the blame to each other, reports AFP.
Joe Biden Photo: Jacek Boczarski / AFP / Profimedia
The world’s No. 1 economy is set to slow on Sunday, unless a last-minute, highly unlikely deal takes place, with 1.5 million civil servants set to go without pay, air traffic disrupted and visitors to national parks to find gates closed.
That’s because neither House of Congress, the Democratic-controlled Senate, nor the Republican-controlled House of Representatives have been able to pass a finance bill to extend the federal budget, which expires at midnight from Saturday to Sunday, at 4.00 GMT (Sunday, 7.00 Romanian time).
A year before the presidential elections, the two camps accuse each other of this situation, which is very unpopular among Americans.
This budget crisis will have direct repercussions on the Ukraine War.
The White House initially requested that the finance law submitted to the vote of the elected officials should include military and humanitarian aid for Ukraine in the amount of 24 billion dollars.
Aware of the risk of fatigue of his great American ally, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky paid a visit to Congress last week in an attempt to convince the United States to help him cross the “finish line” against Russia.
But the unlocking of such an amount seems more and more uncertain, considering the direction in which the negotiations conducted behind the scenes are heading.
A handful of elected Trumpist Republicans refuse to unlock new aid to Kiev, appreciating that these funds need to be allocated to managing the migration crisis in the United States.
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These lieutenants of Donald Trump, who have disproportionate power due to a very fragile majority of Republicans in the House of Representatives, already pushed the United States to the edge of the political-financial precipice four months ago, on the file of raising the debt ceiling.
They received from the former president – who could face Joe Biden in 2024 – the order to “paralyze” the federal state, if they do not win in “all” the budget files under debate.
Democratic President Joe Biden believes the ball is in the Republicans’ court in the House of Representatives.
On the contrary, the president of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy, elected at the price of numerous agreements with the Trumpists, accuses the Democrats of wanting to “paralyze the Government”.
During the presidency of Donald Trump, the United States recorded the longest “shutdown”, in the winter of 2018-2019.
According to several estimates, the American GDP then lost more than three billion dollars
A few hours before the deadline, America is preparing for another closure – total or partial – of services.
Officials began to be notified of the imminence of this paralysis.
Most of the famous American national parks, like Yosemite and Yellowstone, will close their gates.
Air traffic would be severely disrupted, as air traffic controllers and Transportation Security Agency (TSA) officials are also targeted.
Some food aid recipients may no longer receive this aid.
Each week of “shutdown” could cost 0.2 percentage points of the GDP of the United States in the fourth quarter, according to a note by economists from Goldman Sachs.
