President Barack Obama signs legislation to reopen government and avert default; federal employees directed to return to work

Our lat­est Repub­li­can-insti­gat­ed man­u­fac­tured fis­cal cri­sis is over. Finally.

From the White House, received moments ago:

On Thurs­day, Octo­ber 17, 2013, the Pres­i­dent signed into law:

H.R. 2775, the “Con­tin­u­ing Appro­pri­a­tions Act, 2014,” which pro­vides fis­cal year 2014 appro­pri­a­tions for projects and activ­i­ties of the Fed­er­al Gov­ern­ment through Wednes­day, Jan­u­ary 15, 2014.  The effec­tive time for the con­tin­u­ing res­o­lu­tion begins on Octo­ber 1, 2013.  H.R. 2775 also extends the Nation’s debt lim­it through Feb­ru­ary 7, 2014.

H.R. 2775 is now the law. That means the shut­down is over and there will be no default tomor­row. We have nar­row­ly avoid­ed what could have been a major, awful, ter­ri­ble, hor­ri­ble, no-good eco­nom­ic catastrophe.

Pri­or to the bill sign­ing, Pres­i­dent Oba­ma’s bud­get direc­tor, Sylvia Math­ews Bur­well, announced that fed­er­al employ­ees would be expect­ed back at work on Thurs­day morn­ing.  “Employ­ees should be check­ing the news and OPM’s web­site for fur­ther updates,” she said in a brief state­ment issued at 7:55 PM Pacif­ic Day­light Time.

The White House lat­er released the text of a mem­o­ran­dum pre­pared by Bur­well for agency lead­ers and Cab­i­net depart­ments. The mem­o­ran­dum reads as follows:

M‑14–01
Mem­o­ran­dum for the heads of exec­u­tive depart­ments and agencies

FROM: Sylvia M. Bur­well, Director
SUBJECT: Reopen­ing Depart­ments and Agencies

This mem­o­ran­dum fol­lows the Sep­tem­ber 30th mem­o­ran­dum M‑13–24, and updates the sta­tus of appro­pri­a­tions for Fis­cal Year 2014.

Today, the Pres­i­dent signed a con­tin­u­ing res­o­lu­tion that brings employ­ees back to work and reopens many gov­ern­ment func­tions. All employ­ees who were on fur­lough due to the absence of appro­pri­a­tions may now return to work.

You should reopen offices in a prompt and order­ly manner.

We appre­ci­ate very much your coop­er­a­tion and efforts dur­ing this dif­fi­cult peri­od. Thank you and your teams for your ser­vice and your con­tin­ued work on behalf of the Amer­i­can peo­ple under the chal­leng­ing cir­cum­stances of the past few weeks.

Reopen­ing the gov­ern­ment won’t be sim­ple, easy, or cheap, but at least it will begin hap­pen­ing as of tomor­row morn­ing, and that is wel­come news for every Amer­i­can fam­i­ly and every Amer­i­can busi­ness. All of the cru­cial pub­lic ser­vices that depend on con­gres­sion­al appro­pri­a­tions will begin func­tion­ing again.

Mean­while, the Depart­ment of the Trea­sury will be able to pay our nation’s bills, at least until Feb­ru­ary, when fur­ther con­gres­sion­al action will be needed.

“We wel­come the bipar­ti­san action Con­gress is tak­ing to resolve this cri­sis, re-open the gov­ern­ment, and lift the cloud of uncer­tain­ty hang­ing over the econ­o­my,” said Sec­re­tary Jacob Lew in a state­ment released by the Depart­ment of the Trea­sury.

“Over two hun­dred and twen­ty-four years, the Unit­ed States has estab­lished our cred­it as the strongest in the world. The Unit­ed States is the anchor of the inter­na­tion­al finan­cial sys­tem and the world’s reserve cur­ren­cy. We are the world’s largest econ­o­my with the deep­est and most liq­uid finan­cial mar­kets. When risk ris­es, the flight to safe­ty and to qual­i­ty brings investors to U.S. markets.”

“Because of today’s efforts, we will con­tin­ue to hon­or all of our com­mit­ments – a core Amer­i­can val­ue – and pre­serve the full faith and cred­it of the Unit­ed States.”