US courts set to run out of money, begin furloughs as shutdown lingers

By Nate Raymond

(Reuters) -The U.S. federal court system starting on Monday will begin curtailing non-essential functions and furloughing some employees after exhausting what funds it had left to sustain paid operations during the U.S. government shutdown.

The announcement, in a Thursday internal memo reviewed by Reuters, means the federal judiciary will for the first time in nearly three decades be forced to send some of its over 33,000 employees home and require others to work without a paycheck after Congress failed to pass legislation keeping the courts and the rest of the government funded.

The shutdown has already caused widespread delays in civil lawsuits involving federal agencies, as many of their employees have been furloughed. However, judges overseeing numerous legal challen