Politics & Government

Malloy: Connecticut Can Withstand Three Weeks of a Government Shutdown

The governor said Friday that Connecticut had enough cash on hand to last about three weeks should the federal government shut down.

Gov. Dannel P. Malloy held a hastily arranged press conference late Friday afternoon to assure Connecticut residents that the state could weather a shutdown of the federal government for about three weeks. Any longer than that, the governor said, and the state’s finances would start getting tight.

“We can withstand very easily any shutdown of the federal government with respect to our own cash flow situation for upwards of three weeks,” Malloy told reporters at the state Capitol in Hartford. “After that, we would have to look at alternative finance vehicles to raise cash necessary to meet the federal obligations that would not be paid for and would be too troublesome and burdensome to the citizens and institutions of this state if we were not to pay those bills in a timely fashion.”

Malloy said the state had “prepared well” for the looming shutdown, and would treat the event like it would any other emergency crisis.

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“We are preparing for this storm just like we would prepare for any other rain event or snow event,” Malloy said. “It is incumbent upon us to communicate.”

As of about 6:30 p.m. Friday evening, lawmakers on Capitol Hill still had not reached agreement on a budget to finance the federal government for the coming fiscal year, and the New York Times was reporting that Democrats and Republicans remained far apart and a shutdown appeared likely when current government funding runs out at midnight.

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Under such a scenario, “non-essential” government services would be discontinued, while services such as armed forces, air traffic management, corrections and utilities would be continued.

According to a National Public Radio report, government services that would be impacted immediately would by the shutdown would include the country’s 394 National Parks, which would all be closed, while non-essential employees of the federal government would find themselves furloughed without pay. Amtrak and the U.S. Postal Service would continue to operate, according to NPR, and people would still receive their Social Security checks, although members of the Social Security Administration would not be on hand to answer questions or process new claims.

Malloy said he was disappointed and embarrassed by the looming threat of a government shutdown, and chalked it up to a clash of ideologies and a Republican attempt to use the current battle over the federal budget to strip funding from Planned Parenthood.

“It is absolutely needless and the wrong thing to do,” said the Democratic governor. “I want to say quite clearly I do not believe this to be about money but ideology. The idea that a federal government would shutdown in order to remove…funds…to an agency that prevents more abortions in this country than any other single agency in the United States is quite an embarrassment.”

When asked, Malloy said that if a shutdown were to extend beyond three weeks, Connecticut would have to borrow money to meet some of its federal obligations, such as Medicaid reimbursement.

“It would be short term borrowing,” Malloy said. “It would not make sense to enter into long-term borrowing. There would obviously be an interest cost, but short-term borrowing does not carry the same kind of rates as long-term borrowing does.”

Malloy said that without the borrowing, the alternative would be hospitals and nursing homes closing down or medical services not provided to certain residents. 

“We certainly could not afford to have that happen,” Malloy said.

Malloy said that he hoped that “cooler heads would prevail” in the current battle being waged on Capitol Hill, but that he was not banking on it.

“I hope this shutdown will be prevented,” Malloy said. “I fear it will not be, and we will address the needs of the people of Connecticut accordingly.”


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