The pain of the US government shutdown deepened Sunday as flight cancellations piled up and politicians exchanged blame over the funding stalemate.
The US transportation secretary warned that flights could be “reduced to a trickle” within weeks as air traffic controllers work without pay, forcing federal officials to mandate flight reductions.
The disruptions are also hurting air cargo, straining the country’s already-battered supply chain before the holidays.
The shutdown, in its 40th day, amounts to “government dysfunction brewed from splintered national unity,” a CNN analyst wrote.
Such impasses typically end when one party decides the political costs of keeping the government closed outweigh the concessions of opening it. But “as is customary in the Trump era, normal assumptions have buckled.”