in fact, the longest government shutdown ever began on this date 15 years ago and lasted 21 days all the way until january 6, 1996, and during that time, all departments that were critical to national security and public health and border patrol and emergency assistance were still available even though their employees had to be paid retroactively but during that time, during that shutdown, the feds had to cancel plans to recruit new law enforcement officers and they had to delay hiring 400 border patrol agents, the cdc also stopped the surveillance so nobody can get any info about the spread of the flu of the aids for those 21 winter days and elsewhere, workers at 609 different toxic waste sites were sent home and the effects of the shutdown were felt in more beautiful areas like the places maintained by the national park service that had to close. that affected seven million