1. United States
2. Mass.
3. Letter

As a lifelong Massachusetts resident who voted for you both with pride, I write in anguish as the federal government shutdown enters its fourth week. Over 800,000 workers—your constituents among them—face unpaid bills, empty fridges, and the humiliation of food bank lines. In Worcester, a single mother and VA nurse skips meals to feed her kids. In Fall River, a Coast Guard family sells heirlooms to cover rent. These are not abstractions; they are the people you swore to serve. You campaigned on compassion, yet you now hold their livelihoods hostage over a border wall you know will never fully rise. Every day the government stays shuttered, cancer patients at Dana-Farber delay treatments, small businesses in Lowell lose TSA-dependent customers, and veterans in Bedford wait longer for benefits. The cruelty is bipartisan, but your refusal to negotiate—even to pass a clean continuing resolution—makes you complicit. History will record this not as principled resistance but as callous theater. President Trump’s demand is reckless, yes—but your response has been to punish the powerless. Open the government. Pay our people. Then fight the wall with the legislative tools you still control. Anything less betrays the working families who believed your promises of moral leadership. I trusted you to put people above politics. Prove me right.