A provisional agreement in the Senate to end the budgetary paralysis

(Washington) American senators reached a provisional agreement on Sunday to end the budgetary paralysis which has blocked part of public services for a record period of 40 days, according to several media.

Republican and Democratic elected officials have agreed to fund the government until January, report CNN and Fox News in particular.

The measure was quickly the subject of a procedural vote, apparently with the support of a sufficient number of Democrats, to transmit the text to the House of Representatives.

If the deputies also give the green light, the proposal will finally be submitted to Donald Trump for signature.

This progress gives hope for an imminent return to normal, while air traffic and the payment of social assistance are disrupted, and hundreds of thousands of civil servants have been unemployed or have been working without being paid since 1^er october.

“It looks like we are approaching the end of the shutdown,” President Donald Trump told the press, returning to the White House after spending the weekend in his Florida residence at Mar-a-Lago.

According to parliamentarians, the agreement wrested from the Senate by the Democrats should notably make it possible to replenish the food aid program which supports 42 million Americans, and which is suspended due to the budget blockage.

It also involves reversing Donald Trump’s firing of thousands of federal workers last month, and holding a vote on extending health care aid, which is set to expire at the end of the year.

The proposal “will protect federal workers from wrongful termination, reinstate those who were wrongly fired during the shutdown, and ensure that federal workers receive their salaries retroactively,” Democratic Senator Tim Kaine said in a statement.

The leader of the Democratic minority in the Senate, Chuck Schumer, however deplored that the extension of health aid was subject to a vote and not a direct adoption.

“This fight will and must continue,” he said in the Upper House.

Thanksgiving Worries

Due to the effect of the budgetary paralysis on air traffic control, more than 2,700 flights in the United States were canceled and 10,000 delayed on Sunday, according to the FlightAware website.

Affected in particular are Newark and LaGuardia airports in New York, O’Hare in Chicago and Hartsfield-Jackson in Atlanta.

Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy warned Sunday that an extension of the budget shutdown would make the situation worse as the Thanksgiving holiday at the end of the month approaches.

“Air traffic will be reduced to nothing while everyone wants to travel to see their family,” he warned on Fox News.

“You’re going to see fewer air traffic controllers coming to work, which means there’s only going to be a handful of flights taking off and landing,” he added.

A return to normal air traffic could take days after the paralysis ends, while federal funding, which includes salaries, restarts the machine.

Mr. Trump cited budgetary paralysis, due to disagreements between Republicans and Democrats in Congress, as one of the causes of the series of electoral defeats suffered by his camp on November 4.