The President has signed an executive order dated December 19, 2018 closing most federal government offices (including the USPTO) on Monday, December 24, 2018. This of course raises the usual question whether or not the closure constitutes “a federal holiday in the District of Columbia”. To answer this question, Director Iancu has issued a statement dated Friday, December 21, 2018 deeming the closure to be such a federal holiday.
This means that any response that would be due at the USPTO on December 22, 23, 24, or 25, 2018 will be timely if it is filed on Wednesday, December 26, 2018.
The US entered a partial shutdown of the federal government a few hours ago, and it would thus be natural to wonder whether this might affect the USPTO, for example when the Office would be scheduled to reopen on Wednesday, December 26. Here is what the USPTO web site says:
… the USPTO remains open for business as normal. This is possible because the agency has access to prior-year fee collections, which enables the USPTO to continue normal operations for a few weeks. Should the USPTO exhaust these funds before a partial government shutdown comes to an end, the agency would have to shut down at that time, although a small staff would continue to work to accept new applications and maintain IT infrastructure, among other functions.