Shutdown Escalates as Federal Websites Load With “Blame the Radical Left” Banners

WASHINGTON, D.C. — The government may be closed, but its websites are apparently wide open for campaign season. Visitors to agencies like the Treasury Department are now greeted not with basic service updates, but with bright banners declaring: “The radical left has chosen to shut down the United States government.”

Traditionally, federal websites during a shutdown simply inform Americans which services are suspended. But under Trump, the internet arm of the federal government has been converted into a live-action attack ad. Pop-up boxes now direct citizens to blame Democrats for the funding lapse, while some agencies even encouraged furloughed workers to set out-of-office messages parroting the same line.

Ethics experts call it “unprecedented” and “flat-out illegal,” but the Trump administration seems unbothered. After all, the Hatch Act may prohibit turning government resources into campaign billboards—but, as one HUD official put it, “the Hatch Act doesn’t trend on Truth Social.”

The real kicker: while 750,000 federal employees remain unpaid, the administration found the time and resources to make sure the first thing Americans see online is a taxpayer-funded slogan blaming “the radical left.”

Even with the government at a standstill, one thing remains fully operational: the partisan blame machine. In a shutdown that has frozen services nationwide, only the propaganda budget seems to be running at full capacity.