On December 22, the federal government of the United States suffered a partial closure which lasted for 35 days, resulting in the longest governmental closure in history. This closure, the result of a budget dispute between the President and the House of Representatives, affected more than a quarter of the US government agencies. Among the affected agencies, directly and indirectly, were leading research agencies such as the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Science Foundation (NSF), and the National Institutes of Health (NIH).