*By Christian Smith*
As the partial federal government shutdown enters enters its 27th day, American businesses are beginning to feel the strain.
For Fat Brands Inc. ($FAT) ー which owns a number of fast food brands Fatburger, among them ー the consequences of the shutdown are slowly trickling up to corporate, but president and CEO Andy Wiederhorn said franchisees are thus far bearing the brunt of the shutdown.
"I think it's really much harder on the franchise operators because they're trying to build stores they've already started to build, or they've got a lease signed up and now they need their loan to get going for construction," Wiederhorn said Wednesday in an interview with Cheddar.
With the Small Business Administration closed, small businesses are unable to access SBA-backed loans. The SBA usually manages over 300 loans each day, which [The Washington Post](https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2019/01/11/congresswoman-calls-trump-restart-small-business-lending-level-anxiety-is-unprecedented/?utm_term=.f50572777f74) reported amounts to roughly $200 million worth of loans for small and midsize businesses.
Small business owners in need of capital during the shutdown must turn to other sources of funding, such as non-SBA-backed loans, which generally come with higher interest rates.
But Wiederhorn noted that every sector of business ー even the major players ー is experiencing negative side effects.
"It's affecting everybody, not just small business, but large business," he said. "It's really very difficult."
For full interview [click here](https://cheddar.com/videos/fat-brands-inc-ceo-explains-how-the-government-shutdown-is-impacting-americas-small-businesses).
Face to face for just over two hours, President Joe Biden and Russia’s Vladimir Putin squared off in a secure video call Tuesday as the U.S. president put Moscow on notice that an invasion of Ukraine would bring enormous harm to the Russian economy.
Hawaii Flooding, Beijing Boycott & Disrupting Death
The White House says the U.S. will stage a diplomatic boycott of the upcoming Winter Olympics in Beijing to protest Chinese human rights abuses.
The Los Angeles branch of Planned Parenthood chapter has been hit by a data breach involving about 400,000 patients, but the group says there is no indication the information was used “for fraudulent purposes.”
With rising numbers of COVID-19 cases predicted this winter, President Joe Biden is appealing for Americans to get their boosters and get behind his plan to tackle the new omicron variant through wider availability of vaccines and shots.
President Nayib Bukele announced last week that the Central American country plans to issue the world's first "Bitcoin bond" early next year.
The Supreme Court’s conservative majority is signaling it will uphold Mississippi’s 15-week ban on abortion — and may go much further to overturn the nationwide right to abortion that has existed for nearly 50 years.
Mark Meadows, Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, is cooperating with a House panel investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection.
The wife of Mexican drug kingpin Joaquin “El Chapo” Guzman was sentenced Tuesday to three years in prison after pleading guilty to helping her husband run his multibillion-dollar criminal empire.
President Joe Biden is urging Americans to get vaccinated, including booster shots, as he seeks to quell concerns over the newly identified coronavirus variant named omicron.
