The 2018 Women’s March in Washington will move forward as planned on Saturday despite a pending government shutdown. Women’s March Will Go On, Shutdown or Not:
An estimated 5,500 marchers will gather at the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool at 11 a.m. for a series of speeches before winding their way east down Constitution Avenue and north to the White House gates to advocate for women’s inclusion in the political process.
The Reflecting Pool, which runs down the western end of the National Mall, is maintained by the National Park Service.
A shutdown would furlough roughly 87 percent of the nearly 25,000 National Park Service employees until Congress can pass a spending measure to put them back to work.
All over the country, parks and monuments under NPS jurisdiction would be closed to visitors until Congress reaches a spending deal.
But the bureau has issued a “special provision … for first amendment activities in the National Mall and Memorial Parks” to carry on during a shutdown, according to a “contingency plan” outlined last September.
