The president of the union representing Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) workers on Monday urged Congress to include health care protections in a bill to reopen the government as the shutdown approaches record length.

The shutdown of the federal government continues, approaching a 35-day record set during President Donald Trump's first term. Republican and Democratic lawmakers remain at a stalemate on finding a government funding solution.

Democrats and Republicans have sparred over Democratic demands to address health care issues in a government funding bill, with the standoff leading to the first government shutdown since 2019. We’ll provide the facts on two talking points each side is using to blame the other for the shutdown.

As Congress circles the issue, a poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that about 6 in 10 Americans are “extremely” or “very” concerned about their health costs going up in the next year. Those worries extend across age groups and include people with and without health insurance, the poll found.

It's Obamacare health insurance prices — and how much help 24 million Americans will get with their premiums — that are in dispute.

Even people who don’t rely on subsidies or get insurance through the exchange are expected to see their premiums rise because fewer people in the insurance pool raise costs for everyone. What’s more, uninsured patients typically delay care and end up sicker and needing emergency care at hospitals, which is way more expensive.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Senate Democrats rejected for the 10th time Thursday a stopgap spending bill that would reopen the government, insisting they won’t back away from demands that Congress take up health care benefits. The vote failed on a 51-45 tally, well short of the 60 needed to advance with the Senate’s filibuster rules.

Delays of 10 days or more hamper payments to hospitals and other health care providers from the federal government programs such as Medicare because many of the workers who process those claims remain on furlough during the government shutdown,

The government shutdown is poised to become the longest ever this week as the impasse has dragged into a new month.

Republicans argue Democrats want to fund health care for immigrants in the country illegally, a claim Democrats deny. As a federal shutdown that began Oct. 1 continues, congressional Democrats still refuse to back a short-term reopening of the government ...