Day 16 Update

As the shutdown enters its sixteenth day, the machinery of regulation is no longer paused—it’s corroding. Quiet losses in personnel, data, and coordination are eroding the capacity of agencies like FDA and USDA to recover cleanly when funding resumes. The visible crises have given way to quieter failures: deferred oversight, expired comment periods, and structural strain across federal programs that were never designed to operate on “carryover mode” for this long.

The Present Landscape

Silence from FDA and USDA

Neither FDA nor USDA issued new communications overnight. Internal operations continue under existing lapse plans, with only essential, safety-critical activities moving. No new inspection or enforcement bulletins have been posted, and no rulemaking dockets have reopened.
Status: unchanged, but quietly worsening.

• FDA review functions are thinning as carryover user-fee funding depletes. Expect decelerating review cycles in active submissions, particularly where multi-center coordination is required.
• USDA furlough scope remains roughly 42,000 employees, limiting service continuity in food safety, grants, and rural programs. Data publications—including NASS and ERS—are still suspended.

Workforce Attrition Continues

Federal employee unions report rising attrition, especially among technical and legal staff. Buyouts and early retirements are increasing in response to uncertainty about back pay and program permanence.
The longer these skilled roles remain vacant, the longer it will take agencies to reconstitute review capacity and institutional expertise post-shutdown.
Sources: Washington Post, Reuters.

New Developments: Legal and Policy Ripples

Expanding Litigation

Shutdown-related litigation is now surfacing in multiple courts.

• Federal unions have filed to enjoin select layoffs, alleging procedural violations of the Civil Service Reform Act and APA.
• Private contractors—particularly in research and testing—are beginning to file breach-of-contract claims for delayed payments and suspended work.
• Judicial backlogs are growing, as the Department of Justice seeks stays in multiple administrative and regulatory cases due to lack of available personnel.

While none of these directly involve FDA or USDA yet, the resulting case law may redefine what constitutes “essential function” under future lapse plans.

Administrative Fallout

Regulatory processes dependent on continuous publication—such as rulemakings under MOCRA and FSMA—are now facing technical expiration of comment periods without valid extensions. This lapse may force agencies to reopen dockets, re-notice deadlines, and, in some cases, repeat procedural steps to avoid litigation risk.

For regulated industries, the key takeaway is procedural volatility: submissions, public comments, and rulemaking schedules will not simply resume—they will restart.

The Hidden Costs

1. Data Decay – Ongoing suspension of agricultural and economic data will create downstream distortions in 2026 reporting cycles.
2. Training Gaps – FDA and USDA new-hire onboarding and contractor training are suspended, widening competency gaps.
3. Supply Chain Friction – Import clearance delays have stabilized but not improved; bottlenecks persist for perishable goods and APIs requiring multiple agency reviews.
4. Public Trust Erosion – The uncertainty has begun to affect perception: agency communications have slowed to near-silence, undermining external confidence in federal reliability.

Forward Outlook: When Restart Comes

When appropriations return, agencies will face a triage reality:

• Critical reactivation first: inspections, safety alerts, and immediate enforcement.
• Regulatory reconstruction second: reopening of rulemaking dockets, reconciling expired comment periods.
• Administrative recovery last: FOIA processing, data publications, and non-urgent correspondence.

Clients should prepare now by:

• Documenting all disrupted submissions, correspondences, and regulatory interactions.
• Anticipating additional 30–60 day recovery windows beyond the official end of the shutdown.
• Monitoring agency Federal Register postings for re-opened comment periods and re-dated compliance deadlines.

Closing Note

The sixteenth day of the shutdown brings no new headlines but deepening implications. Each quiet day compounds the difficulty of recovery. The damage now is cumulative—measured not just in missed deadlines, but in lost continuity, institutional knowledge, and credibility.

As this twilight phase persists, the focus for regulated stakeholders must shift from endurance to readiness: documenting impacts, preserving evidence of diligence, and positioning for the moment the lights turn back on.

FDA Atty continues to monitor the evolving situation and will issue the next update as new agency or legal developments emerge.