It’s expected that more than 153,000 federal workers in Illinois and their families “will feel the immediate impact” of the federal shutdown — and 45,000 federal employees in Illinois could be furloughed, according to statements from Gov. JB Pritzker and Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton. Pritzker also said that benefit programs and Illinois’ economy would be disrupted by a shutdown.

Republicans and Democrats spent the first day of the federal government shutdown blaming each other for the dysfunction, as iconic sites representing the nation’s core identity — from the Liberty Bell in Pennsylvania to Pearl Harbor in Hawaii — were temporarily closed.

As the U.S. federal government shutdown started, Indiana leaders from opposite sides of the aisle had different opinions on who was to blame.

Already diminished by cuts by the Trump administration, the U.S. Education Department will see more of its work come to a halt due to the government shutdown.

Crowds of people loaded onto boats to tour the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island Wednesday morning with no immediate signs of the government shutdown that is triggering the furlough of about two-thirds of National Park Service employees.

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Attorney General Pam Bondi and White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller on Wednesday rallied members of a federal law enforcement task force that has begun operating in Memphis as part of President Donald Trump’s crime-fighting plan for the city.

Pope Leo XIV has intervened for the first time in an abortion dispute roiling the U.S. Catholic Church by raising the seeming contradiction over what it really means to be “pro-life.”

Cook County Public Defender Sharone Mitchell Jr. and a coalition of legal groups and social service organizations are petitioning Chief Judge Timothy Evans to enter a general order prohibiting warrantless immigration arrests in or around courthouses.