About 24,000 civilian federal employees and 47,000 active duty military servicemembers in Hawaiʻi have been impacted by the federal government shutdown.
Across the country in Washington, the U.S. Senate was unable to agree on a funding bill on Tuesday night.
U.S. Rep. Ed Case of Hawaiʻi explained that although federal workers will receive back pay once the shutdown ends, they will feel the most immediate impacts.
“There is a significant group of people here today, they are either working without pay or they are outright furloughed, which of course, they don't carry pay when they're furloughed,” he said.
“The brunt of this is being borne by our federal employees, whether they're in active duty, or a civilian, and their families and the contractors that rely upon federal contracts.”
Although essential employees like air traffic controllers, TSA agents and U.S. Postal Service mail carriers will still work, Case added that people may not be available to help navigate public services.
“The people that staff those benefits, that answer those phones, that respond to inquiries, they increasingly are disrupted and so responses become delayed,” he said. “Services become inconsistent even if they're supposed to be delivered.”
Half of all staff members at federal agencies like the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Environmental Protection Agency have been furloughed.
U.S. Rep. Jill Tokuda, also of Hawaiʻi, explained that if the shutdown continues for an extended time, more services will be impacted.
“When you look at things like food benefits, [Electronic Benefit Transfer, Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, Women, Infants and Children] those will continue to be paid out, but they're using contingency funds,” she said.
“So if this draws out for an extensive period of time, there is going to be concern about whether or not we can still continue to pay those benefits.”
The state Department of Human Services said that SNAP benefits are funded through the end of October 2025, so there should not be disruptions to households this month.
The last government shutdown in 2018, also under President Donald Trump, lasted 35 days. At that time, the U.S. Department of Agriculture made arrangements to issue a second month of benefits in advance to households.
However, it’s not yet clear if that would happen this time if the shutdown extends past October.
What’s at stake?
At the center of the shutdown is a disagreement between Democrats and Republicans over Medicaid cuts in the HR-1 mega bill, and extending tax credits under the Affordable Care Act, which will end this year. Without the tax credits, people with plans through the Affordable Care Act could see their insurance premiums more than double.
Tokuda said the impact on health care is unacceptable, and if Congress does not extend the Affordable Care Act-enhanced subsidies, people will start receiving rate increase notification letters in the coming weeks.
“These are a lot of small businesses. These are farmers. These are underinsured Americans, like many Native Hawaiian Pacific Islanders that live in Hawaiʻi, they're going to start to get notices that their premiums are set to increase,” she said.
“You can imagine when you're hit with that kind of a monthly increase, you're gonna have to make the impossible choice: do I cover myself and my family, my kids with health care, or do I put food on the table? Can I continue to pay my rent or my electricity bill? And so, what we are pushing for is let's keep government open and let's do the right things by Americans and save health care.”
About 10,000 people in Hawaiʻi would be impacted by the expiration of the Affordable Care Act subsidies.
Both Tokuda and Case were also concerned about announcements from the president about permanently reducing the federal workforce during the government shutdown. Case said he did not think the president has the power to do that.
“These are not people that will remain on the job, but are furloughed without getting paid. These are people that he says he will outright fire. That's irresponsible. It's intimidation. Really, it's in all likelihood, illegal,” he said.
“He doesn't have that unilateral authority, at least without going through very specific procedures. I mean, frankly, it is just cruel.”
Tokuda also pushed back against the Trump administration.
“It's politically weaponizing the federal government and this situation to try to look at what funds can be cut, as well as what employees should either be fired or furloughed,” she said.
“This is unlike anything we've seen before. We've been in shutdown situations over the past decades, but this administration is showing that they will not hold back on being absolutely political, manipulative, and vengeful in the way they execute the shutdown versus coming to the table and trying to actually negotiate and find a way forward and a bipartisan solution.”
The U.S. Senate is expected to vote again on a spending bill on Friday.
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