“Honestly there’s just less uniforms in here. I just haven’t seen them as much,” said Fairborn Family Diner manager Kadiur Kurt.
The Republicans who have majority control in Congress believe they have the upper hand politically, as they fend off Democratic demands to quickly fund health insurance subsidies as part of any plan to end the shutdown.
Democrats have dug in, convinced that Americans are on their side in the fight to prevent the looming health care price spikes and blaming President Donald Trump for the shutdown.
What else is impacting Southwest Ohio?
• Ohio senators: Ohio’s Republican senators emerged from a White House lunch with President Donald Trump fully unified during the government showdown. “It’s pretty easy for us to stay united on this, because we’re not playing games, we’re not playing politics,” said U.S. Sen. Jon Husted. “We’re just saying, keep the government open.” GOP senators said there wasn’t much talk of strategy at their Rose Garden lunch, where Trump blamed Democrats for the shutdown.
Other federal updates:
• White House ballroom: The White House on Monday started tearing down part of the East Wing, the traditional base of operations for the first lady, to build President Donald Trump’s $250 million ballroom despite lacking approval for construction from the federal agency that oversees such projects. The president had said when the project was announced this summer that the ballroom would not interfere with the mansion itself. Trump also said in the social media announcement that the project would be completed “with zero cost to the American Taxpayer! The White House Ballroom is being privately funded by many generous Patriots, Great American Companies, and, yours truly.”
• Student loans: The Trump administration has agreed to resume student loan forgiveness for an estimated 2.5 million borrowers who are enrolled in certain federal repayment plans following a lawsuit from the American Federation of Teachers. The Education Department said the Trump administration is reviewing forgiveness programs to identify ones that were not affected by court rulings that blocked much of the Biden administration’s efforts to cancel student debt.
• Russian oil: The Trump administration also announced new “massive sanctions” against Russia’s oil industry that are aimed at moving Russian President Vladimir Putin to the negotiating table and bringing an end to Moscow’s brutal war on Ukraine. The sanctions against Rosneft and Lukoil followed months of calls from Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, as well as bipartisan pressure on Trump to hit Russia with harder sanctions on its oil industry. Trump has said he believes the Russia-Ukraine war would end if all NATO countries stopped buying oil from Russia and placed tariffs on China of 50% to 100% for its purchases of Russian petroleum.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
About the Author
