"Kay Behrensmeyer was supposed to be preparing for a three-week expedition to look for evidence of ancient humans in Kenya. Instead, she spent Thursday packing her research permits, her fossil-collecting supplies, and maps she’d spent weeks compiling and annotating by hand into a FedEx box, which she shipped to a junior colleague on the project. Behrensmeyer, curator of vertebrate paleontology at the National Museum of Natural History, wasn’t going anywhere. The federal government was shut down."

"California's Joshua Tree National Park on Wednesday will become the latest casualty of the federal government's partial shutdown, closing campgrounds amid health and safety concerns over near-capacity pit toilets."

"House Democrats signaled their readiness for 2019 combat with President Trump with the New Year's Eve release of an omnibus spending bill aimed at reopening the government."

"Set to run out of carryover funds tonight [Friday], EPA will soon close and send thousands of employees home without pay."

"As the hours tick down toward a potential government shutdown, the National Park Service (NPS) is gearing up to clear out its staff across all national parks, but the parks will keep their gates open."

"The partial shutdown paralyzing large portions of the federal government may last into January when Democrats retake control of the House, the White House acknowledged Sunday, as negotiations over funding for President Trump’s border wall sputtered to a near-standstill and congressional leaders abandoned Washington for Christmas."

"The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has quietly folded its Climate and Health Program into a branch that studies asthma and expunged the word climate from the name of the newly consolidated office, the agency confirmed on Thursday."